


Sympathy for the Devil

by bluesyturtle



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Affection, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal Sex, Art, Blind Character, Blues Club AU, Bottom Hannibal, Canon Disabled Character, Childhood Memories, Childhood Trauma, Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Presents, Cuddling & Snuggling, Dogs, Domestic Bliss, Domestic Fluff, Dreams, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Family, Fluff, Food, Foreign Language, Gift Giving, Hand Jobs, Implied Childhood Sexual Abuse, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Inspired by Music, Kittens, Language Kink, Light Bondage, M/M, Makeup Sex, Male-Female Friendship, Miscommunication, Music, Musicians, Parenthood, Past Abuse, Past Child Abuse, Past Relationship(s), Past Violence, Phone Sex, Rutting, Scars, Sibling Bonding, So Married, Tattoos, Teasing, Texting, Their Love Is So, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Threats of Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-05
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2017-12-17 17:32:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 30
Words: 176,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/870138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluesyturtle/pseuds/bluesyturtle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will hears Hannibal playing sax at a blues club and falls head over heels, but what he doesn't expect is for anything to come of it or for the feeling to be mutual.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Salt of the Earth

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BakerStreetMuse](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BakerStreetMuse/gifts).



> _And when I look into the this faceless crowd/A swirling mass of gray blue/Black and white/They don't look real to me/In fact, we all look so strange_

Beverly tugs on Will’s arm as soon as the bouncer stamps the back of his hand with a purple insignia. They weave through the crowded club and make their way to a table near the stage where a few musicians are setting up. Alana suggested he come out tonight and see them play; they’re called Nemean Lion, and they’re apparently really successful. Will likes the blues, and he can tolerate the contemporary stuff if it’s good. They came highly recommended by Alana, so he’s giving them the benefit of the doubt.

He lets Beverly sit at the table and excuses himself to get them some drinks from the bar at the far end of the club. He buys two beers, and a dainty redhead accosts him before he can make his way back to Beverly.

She says, “I’ve seen you in the papers. Will Graham, right?”

Her demeanor is stern and official, though her brilliant blue eyes glint coyly in the low light cast from the back of the bar behind her.

“Yeah,” he says. He cautiously takes her hand when she extends it to him.

“My name is Freddie Lounds. If you ever want to talk about what happened to you, I’d love to get your story.”

He takes his hand away. He should have known.

“Oh, my God, another reporter already, Graham?”

Will turns in time to see Zeller before he slaps him on the back. Will huffs a sigh and lets himself be taken by the shoulder into the crowd of people. Freddie Lounds is calling after him saying, “You could tell everyone your side!”

He wants to go home. It’s bad enough he can’t teach again until his doctor gives him the say so, but the unrelenting press coverage is getting to be too much.

Price comes around his other side and jostles him with his elbow.

“I actually think she was just trying to hit on you.”

“Who was trying to hit on Will?” Beverly asks with too much interest. She takes the beer Will offers her.

“A reporter,” Zeller announces with his typical bravado.

Will smiles at the genuine disgust on Beverly’s face, subtle as it is. He laughs when she says, “If she was any good at her job, she’d know hitting on you wouldn’t do anything.”

“Jimmy, beer?” Zeller drums on Price’s shoulders, and Price nods.

About fifteen seconds after Zeller leaves the table, the lights go dim. Someone carrying a tray of glassware trips and the sound of breaking glass fills the brief bubble of silence. A few people clap. Someone in the dark yells, “Opa!”

Price snickers beside Beverly and says over the noise, “Twenty bucks says that was Zeller’s fault.”

“Not touching that,” Beverly chuckles, shaking her head.

Will takes the bet, feeling slightly better to be out of the house and in the company of good friends. A man on the stage taps the microphone to draw everyone’s attention away from the noisy shuffling of bussers in the dark. Will drinks his beer and looks at the spectacled man in the white jacket.

“You guys are a great crowd already, look at that.”

The same person from before yells, “Opa!”

“All right, well.” He tunes his guitar. He’s an older man, probably in his mid to late forties. “I’m Don. We’re Nemean Lion, and we’re just gonna get right into it.”

He strums a diminished chord, an E flat minor, and then jumps into song followed by a hail of drumbeats. Zeller comes back to the table and noisily sets his and Price’s beers down. He says, laughingly, “Jesus, did you see that guy take out the woman with the tray?”

Price swears and hands Will a twenty dollar bill across the table. Katz snaps her fingers and says, “Damn it.”

Zeller realizes they bet on him and makes a face at Price. He mutters, “Thanks for the vote of confidence.” 

Will pockets the bill, attention pinging between the coaxing blues flooding off the stage, Zeller and Price’s hushed discussion on the blonde who lives in Zeller’s apartment complex, and the low rumbling din of background noise coming from the rest of the club.

He looks down at the five purple words that comprise the name of the establishment they’re currently sitting in. The end of the last word is slightly blurred, but it’s the same thing that’s on each of their coasters and on the wall behind the band in neon cursive script: La Fin Absolue du Monde.

It’s as good a name for a place like this as any. Most places these days feel like the end of the world to Will. Getting shot changed a lot about his worldview.

Will startles out of his sullen reverie when he hears a change in the music; a low, reedy note sustained and suspended in the din of the harmony battling the melody. The tenor ring of a saxophone drifts in between the two forces and eases, an entity completely removed from them, through the break in the song. He picks out a root, a perfect fourth, a perfect fifth, another root, and a minor seventh; the G minor pentatonic scale. Will’s eyes float up to the stage and scan from right to left for the player.

He sees him: a man probably similar in age to the band’s front man but with a sharper edge to him and an undercurrent of something wonderful and ragged in his playing. Extraordinary pain and longing twists into it, losing its fervor in the whirlwind of sound it breathes and dies within.

Will watches the man lick his lips and set his tongue beneath the saxophone reed, engrossed. He goes to set his beer on the table and misses the edge by about half an inch. It plummets to the floor before Will can do anything to stop it and flings brown glass and beer everywhere as it shatters.

Not sparing a thought to how ridiculous it looks, he jumps off his stool and plucks and the biggest pieces he can find scattered around the legs of Price’s chair. An employee sees him scrambling to collect the broken glass and swiftly intervenes. Will apologizes profusely and lets her take care of it from there. Embarrassed, he excuses himself and flees to the bar to buy another beer and a finger of whiskey. He doesn’t look up at the musicians on the stage, especially not at the saxophone player.

Will downs the shot the bartender pours for him and moves the beer in between his hands, cooling his warm palms on the droplets of perspiration. He turns when he hears his name. It’s Alana calling him.

“Will, there you are!”

“Here I am,” he says weakly, carefully nursing his beer.

“I wondered if you’d gotten in yet. They’re good, aren’t they?” She gestures at the band playing. There are five musicians total: the guitarist, a keyboardist, a drummer, a bassist, and the saxophone player. “They just got back from playing a show in New York.”

“Oh, have you seen them before?”

“Yeah, every time they come back to Maryland I come out to hear them play. I actually went to college with one of the members; their saxophone player, Hannibal Lecter.”

_Hannibal Lecter._

“Right, yeah. He’s…” Will looks back at the stage and thinks the words _fascinating, intriguing, different, stunning._ What comes out of his mouth instead is, “He’s really good.”

Alana smiles, eyes on the set. She offers to introduce Will to the friends she came with so he won’t have to sit alone, but he points out Beverly, Zeller, and Price down by the stage, and she nods and throws a hug on him that is actually very welcome and comfortable.

“I’m glad you decided to come and see the band play tonight. This is the only set they’re playing while they’re in town.”

He hears a few other things in her concerned tone. He hears, _I’m glad you chose to leave the house, I’m glad you’re not still bed-ridden or doped up on pain medication_ ; he hears, _I’ve been really worried about you, Will._

He won’t acknowledge it if Alana won’t. She knows just as well as he does that this isn’t the time or place to check up on his wellbeing. There will be a more appropriate time for it later, unfortunately.

Dreading that time, he asks, “Where are they headed next?”

“Atlanta, I think, or maybe Denver; they move around so much it’s hard to keep track.” She laughs at the emphatic drum solo and picks back up with, “You could ask them after the show.”

Will flounders for something to say, but Alana is watching the stage again. The pressure to come back with some kind of reply fades. She says she’ll let him get back to everyone else and saunters off to find her friends in the darkened club. Will slides off his stool and meanders back to the table in the darkness, holding the beer closely to his side.

He slips back into his seat. Katz nudges him with her elbow and raises an eyebrow. He just shrugs vaguely and gestures with his beer. He hopes it translates into something like, _Everything’s fine. Don’t worry._

The band is still playing on the stage. Hannibal Lecter chimes in every few beats with his tenor, handling the lengthy periods of silence in between his phrases with grace and finesse. His saxophone is black with brassy, golden keys and intricate lettering engraved into the black. Will can’t read it from where he is, even when he takes his glasses out of his pocket and sets them on his face. The bright stage lighting helps some, but it’s too far away to make any kind of guess about what it might say.

When he comes to terms with the fact that he can’t read the foreign symbols embossing the shiny instrument, Will resigns himself to watching Hannibal Lecter’s hands. His fingers twitch around keys with precise dexterity, pinky stretching every so often to hit the low C.

The back of his right hand is tattooed in black ink; the inside of his left wrist is tattooed also. Will can’t tell what they are, but he stares at them anyway, appreciative of the way the tendons in Hannibal Lecter’s arms flex and shift beneath his skin with every note flawlessly captured from that other realm where music exists to be torn out of obscurity for a few moments in time.

“Hey, Will,” Price says over the applause, leaning over in his stool to talk more privately with him. “Anybody ever tell you that staring’s kind of rude?”

Will notes Price’s teasing, lopsided smile and tries to laugh to cover his embarrassment. He catches the tail end of the applause and claps along. Don chuckles into the microphone. He says, “Is it all right with everyone if we play a Stones cover?”

The people in the audience clap, and one woman, probably drunk, yells enthusiastically. He laughs and with no further ado, steps back from the microphone to face the drummer. He counts out four beats, and the opening licks to “Miss You” start playing in just the drums and the guitar. The keyboard cues in followed by the bass and eventually followed by Hannibal Lecter on his saxophone.

Will tries not to watch him, but he’s magnetic. He draws Will’s eyes to him as if with an invisible string. He dares to raise his eyes to the man’s face and feels the breath leave his lungs in the same instant that their eyes lock.

 _“I’ve been holding out so long. I’ve been sleeping all alone. Lord, I miss you,”_ Don croons into the microphone.

Will realizes he’s still staring back at Hannibal Lecter when the man rolls his shoulders slightly and bows his head forward to hit a higher note.

_“Well, I’ve been haunted in my sleep. You’ve been starring in my dreams. Lord, I miss you.”_

Hannibal Lecter hits a note, licks his lips, and hits another note. His eyes find Will’s once more, drawing the F sharp out. He has hair the color of sand and luminous brown eyes that look amber against the stage lights. Will bites his lip and loses his breath again. Hannibal Lecter looks away to make eye contact with Don who’s looking right back at him. They nod subtly to each other, and Hannibal takes off in a sultry, resonant solo.

Will sets his forearms on the table and watches, leaning in and leaning in until his back is a straight diagonal line poised over the table at an acute angle. Hannibal continues, one corner of his lip curving upward just slightly. He winks, looking right at Will, and finishes his complicated run of a minor scale.

Don sings, _“I guess I’m lying to myself. It’s just you and no one else. Lord, I won’t miss you, child.”_

Will grins through the lyrics and through the drums, and through his rest, Hannibal Lecter smiles back at him through the light screen separating them.

_“You’ve been blotting out my mind; fooling on my time. No, I won’t miss you, baby, yeah.”_

A series of notes leave Don’s guitar in rapid succession as he’s singing, _“Lord, I miss you, child.”_

Hannibal Lecter steps up to the mic stand beside Don, and they vocalize. Will watches them share a microphone; while they’re not laughing or even smiling anymore, they look like they’re having the time of their lives.

_“Lord, I miss you, child.”_

Hannibal Lecter paces back to his spot on the stage and plays along with the harmony, stealing the melody every few measures and earning a surprised glance from Don every time he does. They’ve played together long enough to know how to combat their sparring egos.

It doesn’t take a person with great observation skills to see that each of them has the presence and charisma of a leader; Will has great observation skills. He can see that Hannibal Lecter could head this band if he made up his mind to.

_“Lord, I miss you, child.”_

Don vocalizes with the help of the bassist and keyboardist now. Hannibal produces the same sounds they are with his saxophone. The song ends in a crescendo and an explosion of instruments playing through established chord progressions and scales. They cut off together, and the people jammed into the club roar their applause and cat calls. Will claps, though he feels too self-aware to yell his praise.

He watches Hannibal lift the strap holding his saxophone over his head and skip off backstage. Don sees him making a break for it and lets him go, opting to address the audience instead.

“I was right. You are a great crowd.”

The people cheer, and Will barely hears the voice behind him over their shouting. He feels a hand on his shoulder and turns, expecting Alana.

“You said it, they’re—Oh.”

“Oh,” Hannibal Lecter repeats, a soft smile stretching across his face. His eyes gloss over Will’s face. He says, “I believe that’s appropriate, yes.”

Will laughs his disbelief and blinks to reassume his concentration on something that isn’t Hannibal Lecter’s mouth. He clears his throat and introduces himself: “Will Graham.”

“Hannibal Lecter.”

They shake hands and linger a moment longer than perhaps they should. Will doesn’t want to let go. Hannibal is warm and glowing still from his time onstage. His energy is racked up to eleven. Will can feel it coursing through his fingers as if they’re still trying to tap out a song.

He hears someone whistling behind him and gives Zeller an icy glare over his shoulder.

“Would you like to go somewhere more private?” Hannibal asks when Will turns back to face him.

“Oh, um, sure. Yeah, that’d be…”

He stops talking when Hannibal’s lips part a ways and reveal his teeth as his smile grows just a little bit wider on his lips. As if knowing exactly what Will is reacting to, Hannibal catches his bottom lip with his teeth and holds, eyes probing and sparkling in the dim light of the club.

_“Please allow me to introduce myself. I’m a man of wealth and taste.”_

Will slides off the stool and follows Hannibal Lecter toward the back of the club, giving Beverly a panicked but excited look over his shoulder. She gives him two thumbs up and an ecstatic grin.

_“I’ve been around for a long, long year; stole many a man’s soul and faith.”_

They walk passed a mean-looking bouncer who smiles at Hannibal’s polite greeting and responds with a curt nod. The cool night air opens up around them, snuffing out the cacophony of the club as the door swings shut. Hannibal crouches down and places a rock in between the door and the frame to keep the door from locking behind them. Will can make out the lyrics, faint as they are: _“Pleased to meet you. Hope you guess my name.”_

“So Nemean Lion,” Will says when they’ve been standing silently looking up at the starry sky for longer than feels comfortable. “Wasn’t that Heracles’ first labor?”

Hannibal looks at him, clearly surprised.

“It was, yes.”

“I took a class in college.” Will shrugs, offering a shy smile. He says, “People thought it was impossible to kill.”

“They did.”

“But Heracles strangled it to death.”

Hannibal sits down on the bottom step that feeds up from the back alley into La Fin Absolue du Monde. Will sits down next to him. He chances sitting closer than he normally would with someone he doesn’t know but leaves enough space for it to be comfortable.

“And skinned it with its own claws,” Hannibal adds.

“How did you pick it?”

“I also took a class in college,” Hannibal says, smiling.

Will laughs, forcing himself not to be lead down the path of incorrect assumptions. He says, “Is that also where you picked up the saxophone?”

“I was encouraged to learn the flute when I was a boy. As I got older, I found the saxophone appealed more to my interests. I pursued it as a teenager.”

“You play very well,” Will says quietly.

_“Just call me Lucifer ‘cause I’m in need of some restraint.”_

“Thank you, Will.”

Will feels his neck grow warm. He remembers he gave Hannibal his name.

They watch each other for a moment, and the muffled drums beat steadily through the door. He hears Don singing, _“So if you meet me, have some courtesy, have some sympathy, have some taste. Use all your well-learned politesse or I’ll lay your soul to waste, yeah.”_

Will sets his hand down beside him right on top of Hannibal’s and yanks his hand away like he’s been burned. Hannibal looks at him curiously, drawing his fingertips down the heel of Will’s hand, down his wrist, and around his forearm to stop at the bend in his elbow.

He tenses when he realizes Hannibal is leaning in. He gasps, “Don’t they need you back up there?”

“In the middle of a song, Will?”

_“Please to meet you. Hope you guess my name.”_

“Oh, I don’t—but…”

Hannibal’s breath ghosts across his mouth and down his chin. He smells like cherries.

_“But what’s puzzling you is the nature of my game. Mean it, baby; get down!”_

His tongue presses against Will’s bottom lip, running along the seam and then across his upper lip. Will’s mouth drops open, and Hannibal kisses him, softly.

_“Tell me, baby, what’s my name?”_

Hannibal pulls back. Will makes himself open his eyes. He twists his fingers in Hannibal’s shirt where they migrated to his collar at some point when Hannibal kissed him.

_“Tell me honey, can you guess my name?”_

Will leans back into Hannibal’s space and licks Hannibal’s lip, mimicking Hannibal’s surface exploration of his mouth. His other hand creeps up to cradle the back of Hannibal’s head, and he presses his lips flush against Hannibal’s. Hannibal tilts his head to the side and presses another kiss onto Will’s lips. They go like that until Will parts his lips, taps Hannibal’s lip again with his tongue, and Hannibal opens his mouth, too.

_“I tell you one time, you’re to blame.”_

They’re full on making out in record time, Will sliding his hand under the back of Hannibal’s shirt just to feel his skin against his fingers and Hannibal squeezing the underside of Will’s thigh.

_“Tell me, baby. What’s my name? Tell me, sweetie, what’s my name?”_

“Will,” Hannibal whispers, running his fingers through Will’s hair and bending down to nip at his neck. “Come home with me.”

Will is nodding and mumbling something like, “Yes, of course, I want to, please. Christ, Hannibal.”

They sit there on the step kissing each other and moaning softly into the other’s mouth, hair, or skin. Will said he’d _go home_ with him.

“Fuck, wow,” he hisses through his teeth when Hannibal bites his collar bone. “Okay, I’ll be right back. I need to…Yeah.”

He wobbles on his feet. Hannibal lets him pull open the heavy door and disappear back into the club. The audience erupts into a cheering frenzy when the song ends. Will works his way through the crowd and makes a beeline for the table where Beverly and Price are still sitting. Zeller probably left to get more drinks.

“Hey,” Will says, lightly tapping Beverly on the shoulder.

“Hey, yourself,” she laughs. “What did you and _Hannibal_ get up to?”

“We were just…we were talking.”

“Uh huh.”

Her grin is ridiculous. He feels himself grinning, too, though, so he can’t really knock her for it. In fact, he suspects her grin might be a response to his.

“Well, I’m going to go.”

“With him? You’re going _home_ with him?”

“Damn, Will. Nice work.” Price laughs, grabbing Will’s shoulder playfully.

“Thanks.”

“Oh, Will. I thought you would’ve left with that guy. I’ll be right back with another beer,” Zeller says, setting down the three beers he had cradled in his arms all the way back from the bar.

“No, Zeller, it’s fine. I’m not staying.” Will says, flat-out blushing at the devious smirk his words put on Zeller’s face. “Okay. I have to go. Good night, guys.”

“Night, Will,” Beverly says in a singsong voice.

Will rushes back outside, fully prepared to apologize for keeping Hannibal waiting. He finds him sitting right where he left him, smoking a cigarette. He turns when Will opens the door again and smiles. The burning need to apologize crumbles away.

“Shall we, Will?” Hannibal stubs out his cigarette and stands.

Will laughs, realizing he never quit grinning. He says, “Yeah, let’s go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Opa!”—A Greek cheer of joy (like Olé in Spanish)
> 
> La Fin Absolue du Monde (The Absolute End of the World) is a fictional film from John Carpenter’s “Cigarette Burns” in the Masters of Horror series.
> 
> Don as in Donald as in Sutcliffe.


	2. Everything Is Turning To Gold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will goes home with Hannibal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _I’m tired of doing what I’m told/Things are moving way too slow/I got no problems, I got no problems, child/It ain’t my business, it ain’t my business, ain’t my style/Now that the love juice starts to flow_

Hannibal drives a shiny black Chevelle with two doors and modest rims. It’s parked across the street under a linden tree in between another Chevy and a Ford.

“A ’69,” Hannibal explains at Will’s prolonged examination of his gorgeous glistening car.

Will is thankful he doesn’t have his car with him tonight. His beloved Crown Victoria would look like a jalopy next to Hannibal’s car. To fill in the awkward gap that has been stretching between them on their walk from the alley, he asks, “396 or 402?”

Without missing a beat, Hannibal says, “396 V8.” A small smile stretches across his face. “Are you an enthusiast, Will?”

“My dad is.” Will ducks his head when Hannibal opens the door for him and stops with his hand on the hood before getting into the car. “Listen, I’m not really…I mean, this isn’t something that I do, usually.”

He feels heat creeping steadily up his neck but forces himself to look at Hannibal. His eyes are warm, even jovial.

“Nor am I in the habit of taking strangers home.”

Hannibal’s eyes shine. He leans over the top of the door.

“Oh, I didn’t mean it like—”

Hannibal kisses him, softly. Will’s mouth falls open when their lips part. He feels the curve of Hannibal’s smile on his skin, warm and near and promising. Hannibal’s fingers come up around the back of Will’s neck, thumb flicking at his earlobe. Will bites his lip.

The smell of cherries must come from Hannibal’s cigarettes. Will wonders if he always smokes the flavored packs or if he chose them especially for tonight because he thought he might find himself in a situation like this, only without a door in the way.

“Have you changed your mind, Will?”

He’s had six months to take it easy and be handled like a fragile little teacup; six months to be responsible and diligent and steadfast. Anymore he’s not sure what the hell he was hanging onto those things for in the first place. It only landed him in the hospital with more problems on his way out than he went in with, though he couldn’t complain about all of them, not exactly.

He swallows his fear and surges forward to press a less innocent kiss on Hannibal’s lips. Their teeth clash; Will swipes his tongue across Hannibal’s lip and inside his mouth. He pulls away before they can really take off, though his hands have tangled in Hannibal’s hair already.

Hannibal’s fingers squeeze in between Will’s shoulder blades. He bites Will’s bottom lip.

Breathless, Will says, “No.”

He slips into the car without waiting to see Hannibal’s reaction and buckles in while Hannibal shuts his door and rounds the front of the Chevelle. He weaves out of the parking space beside the sidewalk and onto the road easily. Schubert plays on the radio; Will thinks it’s an interesting choice for Hannibal but doesn’t comment on it. He can appreciate the subtle peeks into Hannibal’s character the music affords him.

Will thinks the song might be “Orest auf Tauris” based on the Euripides play, _Iphigenia in Tauris_. He wants to ask if Hannibal has read it, if he even knows the song, or if classical music just calms him down after a high-energy set. Those questions die on his tongue. Instead, he asks, “So, which hotel are you staying at while you’re here?”

“Did you wish to go to a hotel, Will?”

“Well,” he muses, scoping out the backseat obviously. “I’m not as limber as I used to be.”

Hannibal glances at Will curiously and appearing the get the joke, he cracks a small smile and shakes his head. He says, “While I am sure we could make do with our present accommodations, I meant to take you to my home about twenty minutes from here.”

“You live in Baltimore?” Hannibal nods and Will remembers Alana said she went to college with him. He says, “Oh, right. We have a mutual friend, Alana Bloom?”

Recognition lights in Hannibal’s eyes along with a small smile. Will wonders how exclusive they were.

“Yes, Alana. How did you come to know her?”

“She picked up my classes while I was—” _In the hospital recovering from a gunshot wound,_ he thinks miserably. He doesn’t say that. He can barely say it to someone who knows him, and Hannibal doesn’t know him at all. “I couldn’t teach for a while, and my boss put her in charge of my students. We met going over lesson plans.”

Ignoring the hiccups in Will’s story, Hannibal asks, with interest, “If I remember correctly, Alana majored in Music Theory. What do you teach?”

“Music.” Will nods, smiling when Hannibal turns to face him. He looks down before Hannibal returns his eyes to the road. “I teach music.”

“Do you specialize in any one instrument?”

“I’ve always loved the piano, and don’t laugh but…” Will chuckles in spite of himself. “I rock the harpsichord.” Hannibal chuckles, too. Will raps his arm playfully with his knuckles; the small brush starts a warm tingling in his belly. “I said not to laugh.”

“I wouldn’t ordinarily, but I own a harpsichord.”

Wide grin stretched across his face, Will asks, “Are you making fun of me?”

“No, Will.” The car rolls to a stop at a red light, and Hannibal turns to address Will head-on. Smiling, he says, “It is one of my favorite instruments.”

They watch each other until the streetlight casts a green glow on both their faces. Hannibal waits a moment longer, the corners of his eyes wrinkling with both amusement and wonder. He turns back to the road, and Will continues to watch him, at an advantage because his attention does not need division from the fact of Hannibal’s presence so near and so voluntary and so _refreshing_.

Well, there is one other thing he has to consider.

He takes his phone out of his pocket and opens a blank text message. He types, _Change of plans. I’ll be back in the morning. Please let the dogs out before you go to bed._

“One of my students,” Will explains, tucking his phone back into his pocket. “She’s going through kind of a family crisis right now; staying with me until it’s resolved.”

He doesn’t say that Abigail’s crisis would never be resolved; that nothing could restore the family she had. He doesn’t say that their living situation is pretty indefinite and that neither is entirely sure how to feel about it.

After a slight pause, Hannibal says, “It was very magnanimous of you to take her in.”

Will thinks he can hear that his words are genuine, so he feels safe enough to confess that which Alana had warned him not to fall prey to. Will says, “I feel responsible for her.”

Hannibal hadn’t asked any of the questions Will felt inspired to give him the answers to, but it feels rude not to provide a context wherein he can learn more about Will. He isn’t used to doing this; isn’t used to anonymity. He probably shouldn’t even broach the subject of Abigail with a complete and total stranger, much less a complete and total stranger Will is going home with to do unspeakably wonderful things preferably all night long. As if it wasn’t bad enough, Hannibal is a musician in a band.

_God, I’m a groupie. Way to be a role model, Graham._

There is something about Hannibal, though, that makes him so unlike any other person Will has ever met. Even disregarding the rock star persona and the rock star abilities of the man’s tongue, Will wants to tell him everything; he wants to know him and be known by him, by the beautiful tattooed man who winked at him onstage in the middle of a Rolling Stones cover and then found him in the crowd. He wants there to be a reason Hannibal went after him, even if the reason was just sex; even if this was their only chance.

Hannibal possesses a strange handful of mannerisms, all of them unerringly polite: the way he listens so attentively to what is being said to him even when his concentration has to be split between Will and the road; the way he takes information presented to him and considers it awhile internally before reacting. It’s endearing, to see Hannibal so reigned in and considerate.

Will wants to tear through that demeanor with his teeth. He’s eager to do it; he’s determined to make it happen as soon as he gets the opportunity.

They pull into a driveway, and Hannibal kills the engine. He looks prepared to say something, but Will’s phone buzzes in his pocket, sparing him the trouble. Will checks it as he steps out of the car and reads the message Abigail sent him, a smile stretching across his face the nearer to the end he gets.

_They’ve been roaming all day mr Graham. I hope you’re out on a date and not wandering around with mr price and Zeller again. I saw the pictures on facebook, not very flattering._

He notes the size of the house, vaguely. Most of his attention is on the screen of his cell phone. Skipping up the steps behind Hannibal, he quickly hammers out a reply.

_I can explain what happened last time. Stop internet stalking my co-workers, Abigail. Go to bed._

He shoves his phone back in his pocket and walks through the opened door when Hannibal holds it for him. He hands him his coat when prompted and stands, more awkward now than he was outside the club waiting to get into Hannibal’s car. The house is huge and expensive and impossibly _clean_.

Hannibal is looking at him, and his eyes are smoldering, and Will’s knees are weak with the heat of it. He looks around at the high staircase and the vast foyer.

“Your last album must have really sold,” he says without thinking. He means for it to be a compliment but knows immediately that he’s missed the desired mark.

Hannibal shrugs modestly. Will bites his tongue and closes his eyes.

“I’m sorry. That was rude. God, I’m…” He shakes his head and puts his face in his hands, ears burning with embarrassment and nerves and something moderately resembling social anxiety.

“Would you like a drink, Will?” Hannibal supplies, ever the helpful host. Will sighs, relieved, and accepts the invitation. He follows Hannibal into a darkened lounge, carefully not looking at anything they pass until they get into the room and the lights come on. There’s a fireplace, two armchairs pointed toward it, and a small bar across the room.

“Please sit, Will.”

He does, and Hannibal crosses to get them drinks. He calls over his shoulder, “Scotch, Will?”

“Yeah, please.”

Hannibal brings the two filled glasses back to Will. He sets his own atop the fireplace and lights it. He settles in beside Will with his drink after dimming the main lights. Will nurses his drink against his chest and stares at the fire.

He opens his mouth to speak, but his phone goes off again in his pocket.

“Abigail,” he mutters under his breath. He glances at Hannibal, and Hannibal nods. “Sorry. She usually doesn’t do this.”

He worries for a moment that Hannibal might suspect Abigail is actually his wife or girlfriend; the thought makes him very uncomfortable, but to acknowledge it would only draw suspicion where there might not even be any to begin with. He sighs and checks the text, taking a small sip of his scotch as he does.

_So wait, you’re on a date? Who is it? Did you meet him at that club?_

Will shakes his head and types a quick response.

_Abigail, go to bed. I’ll tell you about him tomorrow._

“She cares about you,” Hannibal muses, not bothered at all as far as Will can tell. He even looks slightly entertained at Will’s plight. “If I may ask, how long has she been your student?”

Will doesn’t mind. Abigail’s a fairly safe topic where her family isn’t concerned. He downs the rest of his scotch, noting that Hannibal has about half of his left.

“Not very long. Before I got—Um, before Alana had to take over, we had only had a few rehearsals. She plays the clarinet,” Will explains. “She just learned it a few years ago, but she has a gift for it, I swear.” Will trails off, wary of the soft warmth in Hannibal’s face as he watches him. “What?”

“When you speak of her,” Hannibal starts, considering his words as he turns his gaze toward the fireplace. “Or perhaps when you speak of tutoring her, your eyes light up; that level of passion has always captivated me.” Hannibal turns his eyes back on Will’s, trapping him, comfortably, in place. He says, “Beautiful.”

Hannibal tips back the rest of his drink; his eyes remain locked all the while on Will’s. He stands fluidly and crouches in front of the armchair between Will’s legs. He slides his hands up Will’s thighs, and it’s a very good thing Will finished his drink already because he would’ve spilled it all over himself if he hadn’t. Hannibal probably knows. He was probably waiting patiently for him to put it down.

Will licks his lips. He mumbles, “I really am sorry about what I said. It just came out. I get nervous, and things…” He gulps; Hannibal brushes his forehead against Will’s temple. Strands of their hair slot together, and it feels strangely intimate, like it’s something they’ve done for years and not like it’s the first time.

“You get nervous, and things…?” Hannibal repeats, lips brushing Will’s jaw. His palms smooth down Will’s chest, burning him through his clothes.

“It doesn’t really matter.” Will shakes his head, bumping their noses. And damn if _that_ doesn’t feel intimate, too. He holds onto Hannibal’s upper arms and tilts his head to the side, slipping a kiss onto Hannibal’s waiting lips. He’s made this dance more difficult than it had to be, but he doesn’t have to worry about what happens next. All he has to do is feel and give back as much as he takes; he’s always been good at that.

Hannibal’s mouth opens to him, and they’re in the back alley again outside La Fin Absolue du Monde. They’re in a dark, quiet bubble set aside for them to do whatever the hell they want for tonight and possibly for tonight only, though Will wonders if maybe he could garner more over a longer period of time.

He can’t think about it now. Hannibal’s tongue is in his mouth, and his hand is wandering dangerously close to his crotch. Will pushes Hannibal back and moves jerkily to his feet. Hannibal remains crouched with his hands on Will’s hips and a smirk on his face.

“Come down here,” he murmurs, offering one hand to Will. He takes it and slips down onto his knees before Hannibal. He removes his phone and wallet from his pockets, and Hannibal mirrors him. They calmly set their effects to the side and then rejoin, tongues tangling in their mouths and Will managing to secure a position on top, though he’s sure Hannibal will want to claim that spot for himself once they really get started.

He kisses Hannibal’s neck and unbuttons his shirt, stiffening when he feels Hannibal begin to do the same to him. He tries to grab Hannibal’s fingers with his but ends up knocking his hands away completely in his sudden panic.

Weakly, he explains, “I just want to keep it on for now.” The specification _for now_ worries him further. He thinks to clarify, but only says, “Sorry.”

Hannibal smiles and places his fingers softly on the back of Will’s neck. They kiss again until Will’s body forgets the tension and the fear and the doubt. Their lips move against each other easily and hungrily, and they stay locked together like that until Hannibal pulls away far enough to say, “Maybe next time, Will.”

He could just be saying it to soothe Will’s nerves; he could just be saying it to make Will feel less shoddy about what clearly could only ever be a one-night stand, but it works. Maybe it works because Will believes him, wants to trust Hannibal on some level that he probably shouldn’t at least until he knows the man better, but he is soothed by his reassurance. He lets himself hope a little more optimistically that maybe they will have tomorrow and whatever else, that maybe they won’t be limited to just tonight. Regardless, Will is going to make every last second with Hannibal count.

Will unbuttons Hannibal’s shirt and pushes the two halves out of the way to feel that skin under his hands. They halt in their journey, curious and stunned. Over Hannibal’s flatteringly quickened heartbeat is a blue and green peacock with a tail about as big as Will’s hand that fans out over Hannibal’s collar bone and down the center of his ribcage. Will marvels at it, probably for too long, but he can’t look away.

Hannibal’s hands come up around his thighs again, squeezing. Will thumbs at the long neck of the majestic bird.

“This is incredible.”

“My sister,” Hannibal says. He covers Will’s hand with his own. “Did you know the eyes of Argus are said to have been placed in the peacock’s tail?”

“By Hera.” Will smiles. “All one hundred of them.” He presses his lips to the backs of Hannibal’s hands and kisses his knuckles. There is a tiny M tattooed on the ring finger of his left hand.

“You paid attention in that class,” Hannibal observes, bringing Will in for another kiss. He is impressed, and Will is drunk with knowing that he could arouse that response from him. He’s drunk with the other obvious response he’s aroused in Hannibal.

“It was an interesting class,” Will murmurs, grinding his hips down against Hannibal’s. He gasps beneath Will quietly and rests his head on the carpeted floor.

Hannibal pops the button on Will’s jeans. It’s time to move things along.

Will slides off of Hannibal and lies flat on his back to undo his zipper and shuck his pants down to his ankles. He belatedly kicks his shoes off and sends his deflated jeans the same way. Hannibal rolls over on top of him, and Will figured that would happen, but he didn’t account for how good it would feel, how completely swallowed up in the moment it would allow him to become.

It must feel good for Hannibal, too. He holds Will by the hips and forces their bodies to brush together again through his pants and through Will’s boxers. Will doesn’t like the interference of the fabric catching between them. His hands shoot down and divest Hannibal of his pants and sweep back up to his shoulder to push his shirt down his arms. Maybe it’s unfair to do that since Will isn’t comfortable enough to remove his shirt and reveal the too-fresh scar from where the doctors scraped bullet fragments out of his chest, but Hannibal doesn’t complain or ask him to stop.

Hannibal is so comfortable in his own skin and looks glorious enough in it that Will almost feels motivated to shrug out of his shirt, too, but he can’t just yet. Maybe Hannibal will see the marks on Will’s body someday but not tonight; maybe _next time_.

Will shoves Hannibal’s underwear down his thighs and takes hold of him, swallowing Hannibal’s moan as it transfers between them in a wet open-mouthed kiss. Hannibal reaches for his wallet where he left it beside the armchair. He folds Will’s boxers and sets them down beside his wallet and phone. He settles in between Will’s legs and tosses a condom packet onto the rug next to Will’s hip.

He shivers in anticipation and excitement and nervousness. Hannibal detects every single flickering emotion and silences them with a single kiss to the inside of Will’s thigh. It isn’t sexual, even though Hannibal’s naked and Will is, too, below the waist. It’s comforting and calming; it’s reassuring.

“Your Abigail sent you another message.”

Will smiles at the way Hannibal calls her his. He watches Hannibal’s hands slide up his calves, round over his knees, and then migrate back down to his ankles.

“Did you see what she wrote?”

“Briefly,” Hannibal murmurs, kissing the inside of Will’s thigh at about the midpoint of the femur. “She asked if I was a fox.”

Will grins, body quivering with a silent laugh. He closes his eyes and rubs the back of his hand across his forehead. Hannibal is reaching over him for something, and then he is back, kissing Will and pushing his tongue into his mouth as if they had never crossed the lines between seduction and playful banter at all.

It’s perfectly seamless, their interaction. Hannibal understands Will, strangely, at a frequency that no one else has been able to meet him on. He isn’t derailed by the minutiae that might distract or frustrate other people, and he doesn’t endeavor to beat it as one might aggressively battle a threat. Hannibal knows what they are doing, and he is invested in Will as much as Will is invested in him. Hannibal won’t be distracted from the task or allow himself to become frustrated to the point of forfeiting his purpose, and Will loves that because he never allows himself to do those things either, not without a fight.

Before he can even register that Hannibal is slicking his fingers with the lube he must have grabbed while Will was grinning about Abigail’s text, those same fingers are pushing inside of him, one by one. It hurts as much as Will expects it to and not a follicle more. Hannibal is gentle; of course he is. It’s part of his polite set of mannerisms that Will remembers, as his body jolts at the stimulation of his prostate, how badly he wants to dismantle it.

Hannibal’s third finger presses into him, and Will is moaning and writhing on the rug, clutching at Hannibal’s shoulders and babbling pleas to get on with it already, _please,_ God damn it.

He doesn’t disappoint. Over the rushing of his blood through his ears, Will hears the crinkling of foil tearing. He pushes onto his elbows to watch Hannibal fit the condom over himself, enraptured at the sight of his dick heavy and bruised at the head. Provoked by the sight, Will scrambles to sit up, planting one knee on the outside of Hannibal’s thigh and sitting himself fully in saddle as he flings his other leg around. Hannibal doesn’t object or react; he only finishes pulling the condom on over himself and finds Will’s hips with his freed hands to guide him down the first inch or so just until Hannibal breaches the first ring of muscles completely.

Will gasps audibly and holds Hannibal by the back of his head and around his shoulders, effectively crushing them together. He bites his lip and sinks down the rest of the way, punching a garbled swear out of Hannibal’s lungs. He eases his knees further apart and comes to sit fully in Hannibal’s lap as far as both their bodies will allow.

Hannibal leans back to kiss him, and Will groans in a mixture of pleasure and sharp pain, every twitch and tug beginning and ending in his rectum, in the base of his spine, and in his gut. Will tilts his hips and lifts off a few inches before lowering down gingerly. Hannibal’s nails bite into his back, but he doesn’t attempt to push him faster or harder than he can handle. The look on his face is one of utter concentration; it’s the same face Hannibal makes when he’s sustaining a C# over several measures. He’s incredible, he’s incredible, _he’s incredible._

Will pistons his hips and puts their bodies in motion. He initiates a quicker pace than he intended but finds quickly that neither he nor Hannibal can do anything about it now but maintain it. Hannibal’s moan rings and tingles on the skin of his throat. The sound makes Will feel lightheaded and delirious and swelteringly warm.

He shoves Hannibal down by his shoulders and continues to ride him, one hand splayed over the wispy tines of a tattoo curving along the side of Hannibal’s ribcage and the other held behind himself to latch onto Hannibal’s thigh. Hannibal’s hands are at the sides clutching into empty fists. Will tears his fingers away from the comfortable handholds he’s found on Hannibal’s body to grab those twitching fingers and slide them back onto his hips. He holds their hands there for a few rolls of his hips and then arches his back to reach behind with both hands for Hannibal’s thighs while Hannibal holds him steadily in place.

Will licks his lips and tastes sweat. He cries out and in between very vocal, wordless exclamations, tells Hannibal, “Move me, do it.”

Hannibal doesn’t need to be told again. His hips jut upwards hard enough to bounce Will off his stride and knock one of his knees out from under him so his leg slips out further and opens him up wider for the next assault that comes paired with Hannibal’s hands forcing Will’s hips down on top of him.

Will shouts, jaw dropping wide open to allow his lungs to suck in deeper draughts of oxygen. One hand shoots forward to hold onto Hannibal’s wrist for dear life, to solidify the bond between their bodies every time Hannibal nearly bucks him off. He feels the bruises and the soreness already, and it doesn’t stop him from reacting in kind and matching Hannibal’s unruly lust. Will brings his other hand to rest on Hannibal’s navel; the sturdy muscles hidden beneath the skin don’t give under Will’s weight. He still clutches at Hannibal’s wrist with his other hand, unable or perhaps just unwilling to let go.

Hannibal tips his head back, bitten lip falling free from between his teeth red and wet. Will bends down and kisses that lovely, swollen mouth. The hand on Hannibal’s navel slides up to grip his shoulder, other hand stubbornly rooted on Hannibal’s wrist until the hand bound there breaks loose and drags it up so Will falls on top of Hannibal’s chest over Hannibal’s heart, over the body of the blue and green bird.

A hand finds the small of Will’s back; another finds his dick hard and neglected and weeping. Hannibal drags his hand down twice before Will feels a rapid, dizzying ascent whirl in his belly and spread quicker than Will can contain it, not that he wants to. He grinds down on Hannibal, hoping that he’s touching him because he’s close, too. The thought of Hannibal coming because of him drives Will a reckless kind of wild and has him moaning Hannibal’s name like an incantation in a spell.

Hannibal loves it, if the climb of his eyebrows and the labored gasps are anything to go by. His hand pumps Will faster, the other hand climbing up to the middle of his back and then twisting fingers into his hair. Will groans, the knot of pleasure in his gut swelling to capacity and then bursting and lighting through his limbs and beneath his skin with hot, blinding pressure that stacks in his spine and sings in his blood.

He drops his head onto Hannibal’s chest and holds on desperately through the second, third, and fourth jolts against his prostate before Hannibal freezes halfway through the fifth lift of his hips. His body tenses, his breath catches in his throat, and his eyes pinch shut like the weight of what is happening in his skin is too much amplified by his other senses. His nostrils flare, and he takes a deep breath in through his nose and shakily exhales it back out. Will is watching him, waiting for a line or a request or anything, anything at all.

Hannibal doesn’t say a word. The corner of his lips twitches into the shadow of a benign smirk. He assists Will in sidling up and over Hannibal’s leg so they can lie side by side on the rug. Will ends up closest to the crackling fire and takes comfort in the way it warms his skin to match the warmth coating every nerve ending in his body after the magnificent orgasm Hannibal just gave him.

He thumbs distractedly at the buttons on his shirt, wanting to feel the heat on his chest. Hannibal’s fingers slide over his and prevent him from going any further. Will tears his eyes away from the fire to look at Hannibal and remembers he kept it on for a reason. He blushes, though it could just be his body reacting to the flames so close to his exerted body. He wants to take his shirt off anyway just to be brave, just to have some faith in the mysterious creature that just rocked his world, his irrational, unrealistic heart, and his slightly more rational, though equally unrealistic mind.

“Thanks,” he mumbles, self-conscious and woozy but too happy to really worry about the first two.

He watches Hannibal lie flat again, stretching his far arm up overhead and closing his eyes. Will follows his example and even stretches the arm closest to Hannibal up overhead, too. He keeps it there and relaxes, basking in the glow and in the silence only disturbed by infrequent pops and cracks in the fire. He startles but doesn’t flinch when he feels fingers brushing against his knuckles. He keeps his eyes closed, though a smile finds its way to his lips, especially when Hannibal’s fingers weave in between the spaces and gently hold.

Will remains unmoved until the full lips he’s come to adore in the two or three hours that he’s known of their existence press against his. He thinks he could tell them apart from anyone else’s blindfolded; he thinks he could kiss anyone and know it wasn’t Hannibal just from memory, just from how absolutely perfect he feels.

He licks at the lush bottom lip and opens his eyes. Hannibal is staring back at him, a soft smile on his face.

In a hushed tone, he says, “I would like very much to take you to bed, Will.”

At Will’s expression, which could be anything ranging from disbelief to fear to arousal, Hannibal chuckles softly. He presses another kiss to Will’s lips and says, “To sleep, Will; unless you should feel otherwise inclined.”

“I think I need to go to bed,” Will admits, not without regret. He amends, flirtatiously, “Unless I feel otherwise inclined.”

Hannibal’s answering grin takes his breath away. Will smiles, and he’s sure it reveals at least a dozen very dangerous things about him that Hannibal shouldn’t know he feels right now, but it doesn’t look as if it has any effect on the man whatsoever.

He mumbles tiredly, “But could we stay here for a while?”

“By the fire?”

“Yeah, it’s nice.”

Hannibal smiles and wraps an arm around Will’s waist, and he has no idea if Hannibal meant what he said about the possibility for a next time, even after how mind-blowingly fantastic the sex was. What he does know is that he can’t remember feeling this good in years and that he needs to preserve it for as long as he can because who knows when it’ll be taken from him.

He relaxes against Hannibal’s side and rests his forehead against a warm collar bone. One of the peacock’s tails lines up with his mouth, and he kisses it gently as if it really were one of Argus’ eyes. Hannibal’s chest rumbles with a low laugh, and then they are silent.

They don’t have to speak. The fire burns behind the iron grate. Everything is warm, and everything is perfect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Go read House Music by luvkurai. It’s smoking hot and built off a premise similar to this one.


	3. Confessin' the Blues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The morning after.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Baby, here I stand before you with my heart in my hand/I put it to you, mama, hoping that you’ll understand/Oh, baby, mama, please don’t dog me ‘round/Yeah, I would rather love you, baby, than anyone else I know in town_

Will wakes alone, alarmed at his surroundings and at his state of undress beneath the sheet drawn up to his shoulders. The previous night comes back to him in pulses and then in more coherent actions strung together like short silent films punctuated by moments of clarity, moments of intensity, and moments of chagrined social awkwardness; Hannibal craving Will just as much as Will craved him, Hannibal watching Will in the hall or by the fire, and the spaces in between where Will did very little in the way of helping himself get laid.

He checks his phone and flips blearily through the three unread texts Abigail sent him last night. They sent to his phone in five-minute intervals exactly as if she waited that long so she wouldn’t seem so insistent. He smiles as he reads them, the first one fresh in his mind from Hannibal’s paraphrasing the night before.

_Who did you meet at the club? I bet he’s a fox. He’s a fox isn’t he?_

_That band you went to see is called Nemean Lion right?_

_I’m going to bed. Night mr Graham._

The last one stays in his mind for a moment since it follows after a text that sounds like a perambulatory heads-up preceding an overt session of research. She hinted that she’d done it recently via Facebook, so the act wouldn’t terribly surprise him. If his personal life distracts her from her own for a while, he can bear the brunt of her curiosity, to a point.

In fact, she probably had done a bit of research just to find out what bands played in Baltimore last night. He would have to talk to her when he got home.

_Oh, speaking of which._

He pushes up off the mattress and swings his legs over the bed, immediately aware of his age and of the last time his body saw the kind of action it did with Hannibal a mere several hours ago. He leans onto one side and then the other before switching back, finding that his right leg hurts marginally less, which is probably because he’d lain on that side when they had forgone sleep and mutually submitted to being _otherwise inclined_.

He gets up and finds his boxers before stumbling into the bathroom attached to the bedroom to gargle with the mouthwash by the sink and tends to his morning appearance. It’s as he steps back into Hannibal’s room to gingerly bend down and search out his jeans halfway tucked under Hannibal’s bed that the image of himself in the reflection hits him; he finds his shirt buried underneath one pant leg halfway hidden and wrinkled throughout.

He fell asleep without his shirt and woke up without his shirt. Hannibal had been behind him, and he wanted to feel him in case next time never came, and they had fallen asleep that way. Hannibal rose before Will did, and Hannibal had definitely seen in the bright light of morning what he wouldn’t have seen in the dark last night. Will tries to push that unfortunate hiccup out of his mind; he can’t guess at what kind of picture his scar paints of him in Hannibal’s mind.

He shakes his jeans out to undo the state of them after being heaped on the floor of Hannibal’s room all night and pulls them on. When he opens the door to the upstairs hall, the wonderful smell of bacon assaults his nose, and a sporadic few thoughts ping around in his head and spark pleasant little bursts of warmth in his knees, stomach, and chest.

A particularly persistent, yet fragmented impulse that prods at the light-sensitive hemispheres of his brain goes along the lines of artfully jumping Hannibal after breakfast.

 _Or during breakfast,_ he considers lazily as he descends the stairs and treads quietly into the kitchen. Hannibal dressed himself in coal black jeans and a pale violet dress shirt opened at his throat to reveal the very tips of the metallic green and iridescent blue tail feathers inked on his clavicle. The casual but improbably elegant outfit makes him look every bit the part of a sax player in a blues band. He stands before the stove barefoot and holding the handle of the frying pan with his hand bent delicately at an angle to expose the inside of a tattooed wrist.

For about ten long seconds, Hannibal ponders the state of the eggs cooking over the stovetop, unsuspecting of Will’s eyes on him. He flicks the pan twice so the eggs flip in a well-practiced parabola, shuts off the flame, and satisfied, leans across the counter for the plates already garnished with the bacon and helpings of neat hash brown squares. Will holds back the question of how long Hannibal has been down here making food for them in case asking makes him sound suspicious or ungrateful.

Hannibal catches sight of him out of the corner of his eye in the middle of scooping half the eggs onto one of the plates and turns to offer an eye-crinkling smile. It would almost certainly melt Will into a quivering heap of goo if he were standing close enough to touch Hannibal and kiss him and pull him in closer. His unsteady legs house a fine tremble anyway, and Hannibal watching him and smiling at him does nothing to soothe the imbalance fluttering in Will’s already fuzzy consciousness.

“I made breakfast,” Hannibal announces softly. Will cracks a small smile, amused at the statement because of course Hannibal made breakfast. A worried crease settles in Hannibal’s brow, and he asks, “Are you a vegetarian? Forgive me, I never asked.”

Will actually laughs at Hannibal’s apologetic tone and shakes his head. He says, “No, not a vegetarian.” He walks further into the kitchen, wary of Hannibal’s razor sharp focus pinned to him as he draws nearer and tuned in to the steady quickening of his heartbeat the closer he gets. Bashfully, he adds, “Thank you for all this. I was just going to sneak out and maybe leave you with my number.”

“Maybe?” Hannibal asks with one fair eye brow arched and one hand smoothing over Will’s hip. He drops his eyes to Will’s lips and leans in slowly, purposely leaving enough time for Will to reply.

He mumbles, “Well, okay. I would have left my number.”

Hannibal hums his approval and kisses Will once and then twice before kissing his cheekbone and curve of his ear right where the cartilage begins. He murmurs, with an almost chipper undertone, “I programmed mine into your phone this morning.”

“You, what?” Will asks around a breathless laugh, all five of his senses honed in on Hannibal’s signals, on his pheromones, on his softly muffled sounds, and on his proximity that feels more and more like a warm blanket from the entirety of the world. Will pats at his pocket and then drops his hand to Hannibal’s fingers where they gently grip at a spot higher up on his waist; the bruised skin smarts a little bit but not enough for Will to ask him to stop. He left his phone on the nightstand by Hannibal’s bed or on the pillow or in between the sheets.

Maybe Hannibal will go up with him later to look for it.

“I thought you might try to leave without saying goodbye, so I took the least invasive precautions in case that is what you decided to do.”

A thought occurs to Will. He says, “My phone has a lock on it.”

“I may have seen you enter the code,” he is somewhat hesitant to admit. He continues, “Before we made love the first time.”

Will pulls back to look at Hannibal and has to look away after a few seconds pass them by. He licks his lips, torn between admiration, affection, and uncertainty. He can’t help that Hannibal utterly transfixes and charms him. Hannibal ducks his head so his forehead presses against Will’s hair; his fingers flex beneath Will’s in question.

“Something of a force of habit,” Hannibal explains; an apologetic chord weaves its way into his voice again. “Perhaps you might want to change it when I next leave the room.”

“It’s upstairs,” Will says distractedly. He stares at the brushstrokes of the peacock’s tail feathers poking out from beneath Hannibal’s shirt collar and brushes the soft material to the side to reveal one of Argus’ staring eyes. He takes a subtle breath in and whispers, “Thank you for covering me with the sheet this morning.”

“I felt guilty for going into your phone, and as I recall, you were adamant about keeping your chest hidden from me.”

 _Chest,_ Will repeats in his head. _Not stomach or back or shoulder; chest._

Hannibal saw it.

“Please, Will.”

He can’t figure out what Hannibal is asking him to do until his hand lands on Will’s arm, and they’re walking together to the counter; their plates are no longer steaming, but the food still retains appetizing warmth. They sit together, and Will eats mechanically, trying not to draw attention to himself. He compliments the bacon because nothing really beats smoky and savory bacon in the morning and even the cold, fearful dread balled up in his guts can’t distract from it, but Hannibal detects the shift in his demeanor. Intuitively, he guesses right that the thing with the phone really doesn’t trouble him all that much.

Calmly and without a single decipherable emotion laced in with his statement, Hannibal says, “Your scar is quite beautiful, Will.”

Will stares at him wordlessly and equally void of emotion. Hannibal returns it and takes another bite of sausage and scrambled eggs. After a heavily charged moment, Will breaks in his resolve and laughs. He laughs and for fear of how he’ll react if he doesn’t laugh, he doesn’t try to stop. Hannibal stands and pours Will a glass of orange juice.

“Beautiful isn’t how I see it.”

“No, it wouldn’t be.”

Will watches Hannibal take a measured bite of the bacon and drink his orange juice. Will has some, too, and as he’s licking the pulp from his upper lip, Hannibal’s eyes track back to his. Will asks him, “How do you see it then?”

As if he were appraising a diamond or examining a rare species of lepidopteron, Hannibal casts his eyes across Will’s then down the bridge of his nose, down the column of his throat, down to the top button of his shirt left undone, and down to the place about an inch beneath Will’s collar bone. He holds there, and his lips part just so in preparation for the answer he means to give. He refrains for just a moment and then brings his eyes back to Will’s when his words finally come.

“I see it as the place where God laid His hand on you when he refused to let you die.” Will’s face and neck warms at the declaration so freely given. Hannibal returns his eyes to his plate and softly, he says, “Finish your breakfast, Will.”

Hannibal could have scars, too, in order for him to be able to see something so horridly defacing as the mangled flesh left over from the gunshot wound and the stitches in Will’s chest as beautiful—and not just as beautiful but as proof or maybe just a testament to the existence of God.

They eat in relative silence. An irrelevant but not unpleasant topic arises every few minutes, and they discuss mundane everyday things that Will files away for later assessment when his confused thoughts clear and allow him time to adequately reflect on his time so far with Hannibal. They wash dishes and drift in the kitchen for a while; Hannibal aimlessly touches smooth surfaces or straightens out the dish towels while Will runs his fingers along the spines of the books on the black shelf near the hallway at the end of the kitchen.

He sees at least six titles completely in Oriental script of some sort and a few more in French and German. He steps back, thoroughly impressed but determined not to show it lest Hannibal become aware of the fact.

Tentative from the wordless tension in the room, he asks, “Will you show me your harpsichord?”

Hannibal brightens instantly and nods, striding into the hall with Will at his heels. They pass the lounge where they spent the majority of the night before dragging themselves and their clothes up the stairs into Hannibal’s bedroom. Through a pair of huge double doors, Will follows Hannibal into a gorgeously maintained and well-stocked library with shelves lining three of the walls from floor to ceiling. The fourth wall is windows dressed in wispy dark red curtains and the shutters blocking out the light from outside.

Hannibal crosses the room to maneuver them open and let the morning sun in. It trickles in slowly and then floods the large room in that warm brand of yellow light unique to the exact moment when the dawn crests and becomes day.

Will sees the instrument at the far end of the room near the corner adjacent to one of the large windows gleaning with sunlight. He makes his way as Hannibal tends to the fixtures around the windows to best accentuate them and allow the most light into the room. Will watches him fuss with the angles over his shoulder, a small smile fighting for a place on his lips.

He sits down and allows himself to grin as Hannibal peers out through the glass. The sunlight bathes the soft expression on his face in a rare, glowing radiance, and Will can’t stare any longer or he’ll never be able to stop when the time comes for him to need to. He turns instead to the harpsichord and plays a few keys experimentally, noting right away the few strings that need to be tended to. Hannibal flits soundlessly to his side after several chords and says, “It needs restringing.”

“I know someone here in town who imports from Italy if you’re interested,” Will says in a subdued voice as he picks out a few more notes. The strings aren’t so badly out of tune that he can’t intonate and find the spaces farther up the keys that house the notes he’s searching out.

After experimentally testing out the octave he settles into and an arpeggio once there to instill the placement of each slightly off sound in his mental map of the notes, Will starts in on Les Barricades Mystérieuses.

Hannibal says, “I have never met anyone who could play anything written for the harpsichord.”

“I’ve never met anyone who kept one in the library,” Will laughs, looking up over his shoulder at Hannibal as he continues to play. Hannibal’s eyes are on Will’s hands, but once he feels Will watching him, he locks eyes with him and smiles.

“You’re quite adept with your hands, Will.”

“You said that last night,” Will murmurs. He drops his eyes back to the keys to hide the blush that darts across his cheeks and nose. Hannibal’s fingers press along the back of his neck and hairline, and the warmth of his hand alerts Will to the heat flashing down his neck as well.

“I hope you believe that I wouldn’t lie to you.”

Hannibal’s hot hand runs over Will’s shoulder blade and down his spine. Will closes his eyes and bows his head forward, fingers still tripping over the keys about halfway through the song he refuses to quit before finishing. He does believe that Hannibal wouldn’t lie to him; he’s crazy. They’re both crazy.

“So the other thing you said.”

Easily and without missing a beat, Hannibal asks, “About next time, Will?” Will doesn’t reply; he devotes too much of his concentration to keeping the tempo steady and not rushing to the end to speak again. Hannibal bends to kiss Will deliberately on the cheek. Will bites his lip and swallows hard, pressing harder on the keys than he needs to in order to make them sing. Hannibal smiles, and Will would bet money that he’s perfectly aware of what he’s doing. “I meant it, Will.”

The notes skip; he loses a beat somewhere and stutters trying to recapture the measure he had just been playing. He plays a chord but can’t place it in the song; the next few he plays don’t follow any logical succession and serve to confuse him that much more. Hannibal catches his wrist in one beautifully tattooed hand, and the touch relaxes Will’s nerves and coaxes a long, cleansing sigh out of him.

Will studies the back of that hand, skillfully painted in gray-black curving lines and spots the tiny letter M once more on the side of Hannibal’s ring finger in between the bottom most knuckles.

When his calm has returned to him enough that he leans back into Hannibal’s body, Will asks, “What does the _M_ stand for?”

“Mischa,” he says after a moment’s contemplation. “M for Mischa.”

He had said earlier that he got the peacock tattoo for his sister, so Will guesses: “Is she older or younger?”

“Younger.” Will looks up at Hannibal’s upside down face to see the smile he anticipated from the sound of his answer; Will smiles, too. Diverting his gaze for just a few seconds, the smile falls from Hannibal's face. Quietly, he says, “It was my first tattoo.” He steps away from the harpsichord and walks toward one of the couches in the room holding his elbow in one hand.

Will stands after a moment and goes that same way without getting too close. He won’t make the mistake of assuming Hannibal will accept his comfort before he gives some kind of sign that Will may approach.

Hannibal sits and stares at the wall to his right where a massive bookcase stands tall. Will meanders over toward the shelves instead of moving toward Hannibal where he would prefer to go. Hannibal’s retreated to an old place in his mind not insulated by the warmth of nostalgia or sentimentality; he’s gone there, and he has no idea how palpably the negativity emanating out of him with the memory consumes and inebriates Will. He takes down Goethe’s _Faust_ and opens to the page where Homunculus surrenders himself to the sea.

The text is in German, which he should have seen coming, but he recognizes key words every few lines that clue him in as to what’s happening. Will finds the final lines Goethe wrote for Homunculus, which he committed to memory many years ago in high school while researching the author for his final paper.

_In this moisture calm and dear, all I shine on doth appear exquisitely fair!_

Behind him still sitting on the couch, Hannibal says, “I must have been seventeen.”

“Right out of high school,” Will supplies, setting the book back where it belongs. He paces slowly toward the couch and sits on the far right cushion with the arm rest digging into his back so he can angle his body in Hannibal’s direction but not face him outright straight away. “Or were you still in school when you got it?”

Hannibal shakes his head. He leans back into the couch and draws his feet up onto the cushion, instantaneously knocking years off him and endowing him with vibrancy and energy Will had felt before but hadn’t lingered on long enough to really see it. The sight endears and coaxes and attracts, and Will finds himself lured in like an animal to its predator; like a small, thoughtless creature drawn into a Venus flytrap, except not at all.

In fact, directly beneath that enticing caricature lies something wanton yet reserved. Hannibal means to bait Will with a physical distraction from a topic he can’t or won’t discuss at present.

Will respects the implementing of a reasonable barrier if Hannibal can’t yet remove his metaphorical shirt. Will gets it, but he doesn’t care to let Hannibal think he’s been taken in by the farce Hannibal meant, however harmlessly, to manipulate Will with. Instead of letting himself submit to the craving the way his body urges him to, Will takes Hannibal’s hand and holds it and says, “I got a tattoo with my dad when I turned twenty one.”

Hannibal turns his head, a gorgeous amount of visible surprise evident on his face. His eyes soften, and his lips part in a silent chuckle.

_Thought you’d get me, didn’t you?_

Hannibal thumbs at a patch of his skin through his shirt, nudging at Will’s ribs where the ink resides. He circles his thumb around that spot and bunches the shirt in his fingers to slowly pull it up. His eyes flick back up to Will’s to check that it’s okay. It is; it’s more than okay.

“How can I trust my eyes? Do they really see,” Hannibal recites as the material climbs up Will’s skin perfectly from memory. There’s no telling how long he studied it this morning before Will woke; there’s no telling if Hannibal just likes the song the lyrics come from or if he even knows it, though he must. “What is the truth? It’s hard for me.”

He holds the shirt delicately in his fingers against Will’s pectoral right above the tattoo and right below his scar. Hannibal bends down to kiss the voluntarily marked skin. Breath catching at Hannibal’s ministrations, Will concludes, “It’s hard for me to understand what’s really there when all my hopes, they just cloud the air.”

“Do they cloud the air still, Will?” Hannibal straightens and brushes the hair away from Will’s forehead. His fingers repeat the action, grazing comfortably along Will’s skin even after his hair has been secured behind his ear.

Will licks his lips and drops his eyes. At some point he grabbed Hannibal’s left hand and held it in his lap, merely out of happenstance. He yearns to tell a white lie and deny the truth burning on his tongue, but it demands to be told, specifically, to Hannibal. He takes a breath and says, “Yes.”

Hannibal doesn’t overlook the significance of Will’s honesty; Will feels it in his skin and in his marrow that he doesn’t. Hannibal leans in and kisses Will gently on the lips, releasing the shirt from his fingers and removing his hand from Will’s to map out his bare stomach and ribcage with his fingers. He treks no higher than the bottom of Will’s sternum but squeezes and rubs the flesh allowed to him.

Will bites his lip when Hannibal pulls back slightly to kiss the corner of his mouth; his mind fogs with both his and Hannibal’s intent. He gulps and takes Hannibal’s wrist in his hand, which immediately stops Hannibal in his tracks.

He breathes around his fear and around the reassurance of Hannibal’s earlier confession, and he moves Hannibal’s hands higher up beneath his shirt.

“Will,” he breathes, beginning to pull gently on his hand. Will doesn’t release him, but they both halt in their movements to watch each other. Will’s teeth still dig into his lip; it falls free when Hannibal kisses him again, and neither hesitates to let the other touch this time around. Hannibal’s traces the impression left behind from stitches long since removed, and he shapes the undersides of his knuckles against the slightly grooved but smoother patch of flesh that no one has touched directly since the sutures came out.

Will presses his forehead to Hannibal’s and closes his eyes. He can’t bear to see what kind of expression has probably befallen Hannibal’s face. Hannibal’s sigh washes across his mouth and down his chin. He presses a kiss to Will’s lips, his own lips curved in a smile that dissolves Will’s fear and his crestfallen negativity in one fell swoop.

“Exquisite, Will.”

His relief eclipses his self-consciousness, but Will asks, “How?” At the puzzled knit that blossoms on Hannibal’s brow, Will clarifies, “How can you think so? It’s just ruined flesh.”

“Some people see murals out on the streets and say the walls are ruined with them,” Hannibal counters sagely. “Some people see art of the highest caliber unmatched anywhere else for its intensity and for the urgent, transient state all street artists paint them in.”

Will swallows and rubs Hannibal’s wrist with his thumb, unconvinced but not willing to push it. Hannibal doesn’t give him the chance to change the subject.

“When I was a boy I broke my arm in two places from slamming it in a door,” Hannibal says, withdrawing his hand from beneath Will’s shirt. He rolls his sleeve up just a fraction higher so his elbow shows through. Will didn’t notice the puckered skin at the crease of the joint last night. His hand leaves Hannibal’s to trace the pale white scar with the pad of his middle finger. The suggestible, pearly flesh moves beneath his touch and stretches taut before wrinkling again when he releases it.

“Slamming it in a door,” Will repeats under his breath. He almost asks how a door can slam hard enough on a person’s arm that the bone breaks. He abandons the question and mumbles, “When you were a boy.”

Hannibal twists his hand around to thumb at the same spot on Will’s arm so their limbs line up parallel to each other. Will’s lips twitch into a sad smile. Hannibal’s once broken arm, to continue with the metaphor, constitutes a part of the shirt protecting him and the full truth of his scar from Will. Will does his part and doesn’t ask.

A faint sonorous noise comes from the front of the house, and it takes Will a moment to comprehend the ringing as the doorbell. Hannibal sits up slightly and looks out toward the hallway over the back of the couch.

A voice sounds through the front door, “Hannibal, your aunt sent me with pralines.”

Hannibal huffs a soft laugh and brings his eyes back to Will’s. He says, “It appears my uncle has come for a visit.”

“Oh, do I need to go?” Will starts untangling his arms and leg from Hannibal’s warm body and stills when Hannibal’s lips press against his.

“Stay, please. He is a musician as well; he would love to meet you.” Hannibal stands and extends his hand to Will before reconsidering. “Unless you would prefer to go or to wait here until he leaves?”

Will stands fussily to his feet and stutters out, “I don’t want to encroach on your time with your family.”

“You aren’t, Will.”

The doorbell rings again, and the man, decidedly English, calls out again, “Hannibal, I do have a key if you’re just not letting me in.” Will makes for the stairs to retrieve his phone from Hannibal’s room. Over the railing, Hannibal reaches for his wrist and stops him.

“Please don’t feel obligated to go.”

They stare for a few quiet seconds before the lock turns in the door. The man speaks again from behind the door as it swings open, voiced raised still as he can’t see Will and Hannibal yet on the stairs. He says, “I tend to this big empty house of yours while you’re off serenading the world with—Oh, hello.”

Hannibal gives Will one last look, mildly pleading with his eyes. He turns to the man standing in the doorway holding a glass cooking tray and smiles warmly. He waves him in, closes the door behind him, and says, “Hello, uncle.”

Exchanging two cheek kisses as Hannibal takes the container presumably holding the aforementioned pralines, he murmurs, embarrassed, “I’m sorry, Hannibal, I thought you were upstairs.”

“We were just discussing scars,” Hannibal says easily, backtracking so he stands in the doorway of the kitchen. Before slipping away, Hannibal introduces them. “Uncle, Will Graham; Will, Count Robertus Lecter.”

“Hello,” Robertus greets Will kindly, striding toward the stairs and reaching out for Will’s hand. Will gives it and smiles in spite of himself. “Robertus even sounds like a Count’s name, doesn’t it? It’s awful. Come down from there and have some pralines with us, Will Graham.”

“Oh, I wasn’t—I don’t want to intrude.”

Exuding so much warmth and hospitality, Robertus reassures him, “I think you’ll find, if you stick by him long enough, that it’s rather impossible to intrude upon Hannibal’s life.” Purposely, he locks eyes with Will to relay something of importance and great complexity that Will only just fails to grasp but that stays in his mind like a flower or a skeleton imprinted upon a leaf. He nods his head minutely to show he caught the gist of the message, and Robertus smiles.

Will laughs at the familiar curves and lines around the older man’s eyes and mouth. He says, “I just have to make a phone call.”

“Excellent! I have a feeling you're a very interesting character, Mr. Graham.” Robertus winks and adds, “I can't wait to know you.” The man twirls ninety degrees and marches into the kitchen. Hannibal re-emerges before Will can climb halfway up the stairs. He descends a few steps and leans over the banister to capture Hannibal’s lips in a poorly angled kiss. Hannibal smiles against his chin, touches Will’s jaw gently, and turns his head to the left while turning his own to the right. They kiss again, the angle perfected the second time around.

“You’ll stay?”

“Yeah,” Will chuckles and nods his head. “I want to see the two of you in a room together for longer than twenty seconds.”

Hannibal laughs, and from the kitchen where Will can’t see him, Robertus addresses Hannibal: “Let him make his phone call, Romeo.”

He laughs again, turns to look over his shoulder, and then back up at Will. Quietly, he says, “You are the sun, Will.”

Hannibal presses a chaste kiss onto Will’s lips and retreats silently into the kitchen. Will watches the empty doorway a short while after he’s passed through it, listening to the soft sounds of dialed down dialog between uncle and nephew. He turns finally to go up the stairs and call Abigail; his gut tells him that a quick text message will absolutely not suffice this time around.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter and series title by the Rolling Stones.
> 
> Les Barricades Mystérieuses by François Couperin
> 
> ACT II. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Goethe’s Works, vol. 2 (Faust 1 & 2, Egmont, Natural Daughter, Sorrows of Young Werther) [1885]. Edition used: Goethe’s Works, illustrated by the best German artists, 5 vols. (Philadelphia: G. Barrie, 1885). Vol. 2.  
> http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=2112&chapter=163184&layout=html&Itemid=27
> 
> >>Proteus, transformed into a dolphin, carries Homunculus out to sea in a shell that ultimately shatters and kills the tiny, perfect man soon after he utters his final, hopeful line. We add him to the list of optimists that get ganked in literature, Izzy; right there with Gatsby and Phineas.
> 
> Crazy Once You Know by the splendorous Janis Joplin (who also wrote Turtle Blues, hint hint)


	4. Ain't That Loving You, Baby?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will learns a bit more about the Lecter family

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _I could ride around the world in an oxcart/And never let another girl thrill my heart_

“Hannibal Lecter, is that the guitarist or the saxophonist?”

“You looked them up.” Will sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. He brushes his hand over the corner of the bed where he left it unmade. “Which one do you think he is?”

“Hmm, the saxophonist; the other guy’s not really your type.” She sounds much too awake and eager this early in the morning.

“What do you mean the other guy’s not my type? How do you know what my type is?”

“Your tastes are kind of specific, Mr. Graham; like, I don’t think you would date Mr. Zeller, but maybe you’d go for Mr. Price.”

He makes a mortified sound and says, lowering his voice, “I wouldn’t date _either_ of them, thank you. We _work_ together, Abigail, Jesus.” He shakes his head and sits down on the bed, glancing out the window at the spacious backyard. The grass is neatly maintained and so is the single oak tree toward the back wall. He rolls his eyes at the silence, curious. “Okay, why do you say Price and not Zeller?”

“I don’t know. You and Mr. Zeller butt heads a lot.” Zeller taught Abigail before she was referred to Will. “Mr. Price is sort of manicured and polished, too. That other guy you dated was like that.”

“Who else did I…Are you talking about Chilton? I was not _dating_ that idiot. When did you see me with him anyway?”

“He came by the house one day when you had PT. We had coffee, but he got impatient and kept looking at your stuff, so I kicked him out. You weren’t dating him?”

“No, I—our paths crossed a few years ago at a conference. He’s weirdly interested in me. Don’t let him in next time if he shows up and I’m not there, okay? Don’t let in anyone you don’t know.”

“Yes, sir,” she answers in a quaint tone of voice that Will fondly rolls his eyes at. He hears something pouring on the other line. “The dogs kept him on edge, though; it was pretty funny. He thought they were going to eat him.” There’s a pause. “I invited Marissa over last night. I hope you don’t mind.”

“No, I’m glad you’re not on your own. I was going to call Beverly and ask if she could go stay with you until I get home.”

She asks, astonished, “You’re not coming home yet?”

“Um, well…”

“This guy’s something else, isn’t he?” The door opens following a quiet knock. Hannibal leans into the room with a questioning look on his face. Will smiles, and he comes in. “He’s not bad-looking; you think you can ask where he gets his tattoos?”

“Oh, you want a tattoo now.” Hannibal sits down on the bed beside Will and watches him. Will returns his stare and closes his eyes as he chuckles under his breath. “Where did you get your tattoos, if you don’t mind my asking?”

Abigail laughs on the other line, and Will shakes his head. He opens his eyes and finds a wide smile on Hannibal’s face.

“My sister owns a parlor in town.” Quieter, he asks, “Is that Abigail?” Will nods yes, and Hannibal stands to sift through his desk drawer by Will’s knees. Their legs brush and Will really wishes his uncle wasn’t just downstairs. He takes the card Hannibal presses into his hand. “Here is her information.”

“Thank you,” he mouths. Into the phone he says, “It’s called Vilnia. We’re going to talk about this when I get home, Abigail.” He looks at the card again. “Vilnia like the river?”

“Do you know of it?” Hannibal tilts his head to the side and sits beside him on the bed again.

“Yeah, in Lithuania, isn’t it?”

Abigail chimes in, “He’s actually from Lithuania? That’s so cool.”

“We really need to establish boundaries, Abigail.” 

“There are no boundaries on the Internet, Mr. Graham.”

He shakes his head, acknowledging defeat. “Do you want me to call Beverly or no?”

“I can call her. Your address book is in…” He hears her footsteps traveling down the hall. “Okay, bedside drawer or the desk?”

“Bedside. Do you have it?”

“I got it. I’ll give her a call and let you know when she gets here.”

“Thank you. I’ll see you when I get home.”

“Have fun, Mr. Graham.”

He huffs and disconnects the call. Hannibal’s lips are on his instantly. Will drops the phone and kisses back, though Hannibal is already pulling away.

“My uncle was asking all manner of questions about you, and I had no answers to give him.”

“Mm, sexy.” Will nips at his bottom lip. “So you fled.”

“Tactically retreated,” Hannibal corrects him, taking Will’s jaw in his hand and kissing him again. “He’s occupying himself in the studio.”

“Studio as in a room designed to record music?”

“Yes, I built it myself.”

“There are things you can’t do, right?” Will kisses a spot on Hannibal’s neck he found last night and delights in the shiver it earns him. Hannibal pulls away, and the look on his face is playful, thank God. Will worried for a moment he had said the wrong thing again. Hannibal smiles and fixes Will’s glasses on his face. “I’m afraid I am not very adept with cars.”

Will grins and jumps to his feet. He tucks the business card with Mischa Lecter’s contact info into his back pocket, picks up his phone, and grabs Hannibal’s hand before leading him out of the room.

“You don’t wish to stay up here, Will?”

They’re already halfway down the stairs, but Will is sorely tempted to run back up into Hannibal’s room and lock the door once they’re both inside. He says, “I don’t want to be rude to your uncle, and besides, I’ve yet to see you interact with him for a substantial amount of time.”

“Suit yourself,” Hannibal says. Will smirks at Hannibal’s glance back up to his room. He tugs on Will’s hand when they get to the ground floor, trying to guide him down the hallway while Will is trying to go toward the kitchen.

“Pralines?”

“Of course.” Hannibal walks with him to the uncovered glass cooking tray with the chocolate bonbons neatly shaped and decorated.

“Did he make these?” Will eats one, and it tastes oaky and of caramel. Hannibal nods yes. “A family of musical chefs.” He smiles and eats another; Hannibal takes one, too.

“He learned only how to make desserts. For the rest, he has hired staff; that is where _I_ learned to cook.”

“Noted,” Will murmurs. He leans back in to steal a kiss from Hannibal right as he’s finishing the praline in his mouth. It’s too much temptation not to act on every impulse he has to touch Hannibal and kiss him whenever the man is in arms’ reach. A strong hint of chocolate is still present on Hannibal’s tongue as it slips into Will’s mouth. He moans around the taste and pulls Hannibal closer.

“Really, my uncle will be quite appeased by himself in the studio.”

Will laughs and walks with Hannibal back into the hall, waiting for him to take the lead. Hannibal does, reluctantly.

“What does he play?”

“The saxophone among other things,” he murmurs, coming to a stop at the farthest door on the right side of the hallway across from the library. “He gave me my first lesson. My aunt never quite forgave him for turning me away from the flute.” He opens the door, and Will hears the music pouring out of the room, beautiful and airy and melodic.

The playing breaks off as they enter into the room. Will takes in the décor of the fairly large room with a long sofa against one wall and a longer desk on the opposite wall. The consoles and immaculate monitor on the desk demand attention with all their blinking lights. Robertus sets the guitar he’d been playing beside him on the couch that could sit at least five people comfortably. Hannibal takes the computer chair in front of the compressors and then swivels around to check those on the body of the island in the middle of the spacious room.

Will just watches him for a moment, taken with the sight of the intense focus on Hannibal’s face. He catches Will staring and smiles.

“Sit, Mr. Graham. You’re making me nervous.” Will’s face warms, but Robertus is smiling teasingly at him when he looks. He sits and eyes the guitar, cocking his head to the side after a cursory once-over. The cherry finish stands out against the black leather of the couch. He regards the Charlie Christian pickup with a faint chord of wonder.

“You own a Gibson ES-250,” Will remarks, only vaguely aware of Robertus placing it in his lap. Acknowledging the amused expression Hannibal is giving him, he asks, “Do you play this?”

Smiling, he deflects, “Do you?”

“Uh, well…” He looks down, noticing the fingerboard beneath his fingers as if for the first time. “It’s not my string of choice.”

“What would you say your string is? Hanny’s probably got it stashed in the other room.” Robertus wags his eyebrows at Will playfully.

“Oh, no, I don’t…” He tries to hand it back to Robertus, and he doesn’t move a muscle to refuse or accept it. He sighs and rubs at the back of his neck. It’s been years since he played guitar for anyone and six months since he played a true string. “Just keyboards mostly.”

“Definitely plays, doesn’t he?” Robertus smiles conspiratorially at Hannibal. “The modesty’s always a dead giveaway in the quieter ones.” Will passes it back when Robertus beckons for it congenially with both hands. He doesn’t need a mirror to visualize how red his face must be. “Sorry, old boy. Hannibal’s the type to enjoy a good, long novel, but I like to skip to the last five pages and see what all the fuss is about. More like his father than he is like me, fortunately.”

Hannibal comes around to sit in between his uncle and Will where he’s huddled on the corner seat by the armrest. He’s thankful for the intervention.

Robertus gestures with the guitar. “Play us a song, Hanny?”

Hannibal glances at Will, and Will shrugs, lips quirking at the corners. He takes the guitar and strums the C and F chords with his thumb. He huffs a soft sigh and returns to the C, picking notes from it and transitioning smoothly to G and A minor. The bass notes come every other downbeat; the harmony rests on top of the surrounding melodies. Hannibal finds them easily with his fingers. Will watches his left hand glide up the neck and back to first position. The fingers of his right hand work through the lick effortlessly.

He nears the final chorus of the song and shoots his uncle a look. Robertus nods and sings, “I wake up to the sound of music. Mother Mary comes to me speaking words of wisdom, let it be.” Hannibal glances at Will as Robertus continues singing, and Will shakes his head with a wide smile on his face. “There will be an answer, let it be. Let it be, let it be, let it be, let it be.”

Harmonizing, they sing together, “Whisper words of wisdom. Let it be.”

Will chuckles quietly as Hannibal sets the guitar down beside him on the couch. “You guys jam a lot when Hannibal’s in town.” He doesn’t say it as a question.

Robertus answers, “It was the way out of silence for Hannibal in his youth.”

A frown twitches on Hannibal’s lips. As if to save him from a conversation he obviously doesn’t want to have, his phone rings. He digs the device out of his pocket, checks the screen, and says, “Excuse me.”

He makes for the door, and Will hears him say into his phone, “Good morning, Bedelia.”

“She’s the beats behind the Lion,” Robertus explains, picking absently at the open A and B strings with his thumb and forefinger. “In case you were wondering.” He smiles at Will. “Do relax, Mr. Graham. Hanny wouldn’t have left you alone with a madman after all, even if I am family.”

Will drops his shoulders from their tensed position and laughs awkwardly. “Call me Will, please.”

“All right, Will. How did you meet my nephew?”

He blinks at the man. He’s asking how they meet, but he’s also asking why Hannibal brought him home and why Will stuck around to meet part of his family. Will summons his bravery and decides to tell the truth. “He played La Fin Absolue du Monde last night. I had never even heard of Nemean Lion, but there they were.”

Robertus grins at the honesty and how uncomfortable but oddly proud Will is to admit it to him. “Quite good, aren’t they?”

“Oh, yeah.” Will nods, eyes falling to the guitar lying face-up on Robertus’ knees.

“And the stage presence; captivating, isn’t he?”

Will blushes outright and forces himself not to look away. “He, um, he winked at me.”

Robertus laughs aloud and nonchalantly plucks a more intentional string of notes. Will recognizes the tune after a moment as an arrangement of What a Wonderful World.

“Do you sing at all?”

“Not well,” Will murmurs, following Robertus’ fingers on the fretboard. They trail off, and he sets the guitar down. Robertus stands and moves into the connected room visible from behind a glass window to collect a capo from one of the guitars mounted on the wall. He brings it back and tucks it onto the third fret.

“I’m telling you, Will, the modesty fools no one.” Will laughs and runs his thumb under his lip, embarrassed. “Now, I can leave you alone, and we can play domestic until Hannibal gets back, which I will only be a little disappointed to do, or...” Robertus poises his fingers over an F7 with a raised fifth, a mischievous glint in his eyes. “We could duel—ah, duet.” He challenges Will with his eyes and after a moment of deliberate silence, begins to play the same song from before only in the key of C instead of D this time.

Will studies the chord progressions and eases into the music, letting another round of chords pass him by before he closes his eyes and opens his mouth to sing: “I see trees of green; red roses, too. I see them bloom for me and you, and I think to myself, what a wonderful world. I see skies of blue and clouds of white; the bright blessed day; the dark sacred night, and I think to myself, what a wonderful world.”

He leans into the current of the smooth arpeggio that functions as a solo and as rhythm simultaneously. Robertus picks up the lyrics on a key change, “The colors of the rainbow, so pretty in the sky, are also on the faces of people going by.” He nods at Will when his eyes fall open.

“I see friends shaking hands saying, “How do you do?” They’re really saying, “I love you.” I hear babies cry. I watch them grow.” Will smiles when Abigail comes to mind, unbidden. “They’ll learn much more than I’ll ever know, and I think to myself, what a wonderful world.” Robertus slows from an andante to an allargando. Will keeps pace with him. “Yes, I think to myself, what a wonderful world.”

“What did I say about these quiet ones, Hannibal?” Robertus flicks his eyes from Will’s to just over his shoulder. He spins around in his seat to see Hannibal watching him with a warm smile on his face.

“You would certainly give Don a run for his money.”

“Is the band okay?” Will scoots over on the couch to let Hannibal take his seat by the arm. Robertus sets the guitar on its stand in the corner of the room and flips the latch across the neck to keep it in place.

“They are fine. Bedelia merely wanted to inform me as to the current whereabouts of my saxophone.”

“You left it last night,” Will recalls. He sees Robertus turn sharply out the corner of his eye. “Did she get it for you?”

“Yes, I am usually more steadfast in looking after my things, so she had no qualms helping me last night.”

“Um, Hannibal, I’ve just remembered; your aunt wanted me back before lunch. I’ll be heading out now.” Will stands when Hannibal does. “Oh, no, Mr. Graham, you stay where you are. Hanny will see me out, won’t he?” He angles his head at the door and shakes Will’s hand when he comes within reach. “Very nice to meet a fellow old soul every now and then, Will; it was a pleasure _jamming_ with you.” He winks and turns an eye to his nephew. “Hannibal?”

“Of course.” He touches Will’s elbow and nods his head. “I’ll only be a moment.”

“Take care, Robertus.”

“Yes, you, too, Mr. Graham; oh, Will, I mean. You take care, too.” He makes a rather downplayed exit, and Will watches Hannibal carefully go out after him and close the door, blocking out the sounds from outside the room. Will looks down at his hands and around at the room, predominantly empty of anything he can actually play or play with apart from the complex dials on the control panel.

He ambles into the adjacent room Robertus left the door to open. A ruddy brown mahogany grand piano stands on a pristine, elegant rug. Will runs his fingers along the gold engraved words _Steinway & Sons_.

He plays the middle C, holding for a moment to bask in the rich coppery hum of the vibrating string beneath the hammer. His thumb slips over the middle C, his first finger hits the E, his second finds the G, and his fifth depresses the A. The C7 rings cheerfully in the room, and Will hums around it, sinking to sit down on the cushioned bench conveniently pulled out for him. He plays around with an F and a G chord, fingers running up and down the C major scale.

Will stops when his phone buzzes in his pocket. He checks the text Abigail sent him.

_Beverly’s here mr Graham._

He texts back: _Tell her I owe her lunch. I’ll be home soon Abigail._

The door to the studio clicks open quietly, and Will sets his phone on the small ledge for sheet music. He skips around the scale again, nonsensically, and looks up at Hannibal when he walks into the room.

Worriedly, Will asks, “Was it something I said?”

“Not in the way you think,” Hannibal reassures him. He sits down in the armchair immediately to the right of the three guitars hanging on the wall. His limbs settle gracefully and with finesse, but Will can see that he’s on an edge.

“How do you know the way I think?” He looks up at Will, intrigued. His eyebrow twitches minutely. “It was the thing about your saxophone, right?”

Hannibal smirks. “Correct.”

“He didn’t have to leave,” Will murmurs, turning back to face the piano to hide the heat lighting through his face and down his neck. Hannibal’s hand runs across the back of Will’s neck, a welcome respite from his poor attempt at hiding his embarrassment.

“We visited the last time I was in town. He thought it would be proper to leave us to our devices.”

“You don’t want to see your sister?” Will looks up at Hannibal over his shoulder.

“She stayed here the first few days after my arrival. We are having dinner tonight, incidentally. I hadn’t planned on having company today.” Will ducks his head and plays a few soft chords, fingers wandering into an old song. Shyly, Hannibal continues, “I think you would enjoy her company. She has always been the more passionate artist of the two of us; she inhabits her medium in a way that I only seldom inhabit mine.”

Will’s fingers stutter on the keys, and he looks back up at Hannibal, confused. Hannibal is decidedly not a shy person; his timid approach has Will curious, interested, and just about completely enslaved.

“You want me to meet your sister?”

“I apologize if this all seems rushed. It is only that I am due to leave for Germany tomorrow morning and will not be back in Maryland for another four months.”

“Four months?” Will can’t quite explain or ignore the forlorn chord in his question. It catches Hannibal’s attention, too, damn it.

“The last album really was quite successful.” Hannibal’s smile twists funny knots in Will’s stomach; a light fluttering sensation fills his chest. He crosses his legs and straightens out a crease in his pants, fastidious and purposely distracting himself. “If you had rather not, I would understand.”

“Uh, maybe it’s…I mean, if Abigail’s serious about getting a tattoo, it could be a good idea, right?”

Hannibal smiles, and the sight of it alerts Will to how sad he looked moments ago. He thought Will would say no.

“I make no promises that you will feel better about letting my sister take the commission after your meet her.”

“You said she did your tattoos.”

“She did.” Hannibal nods, and Will eyes the opened collar where the peacock’s tail brushes the suprasternal notch just beneath the column of his neck.

“Well, color me convinced.” Will smiles and turns back to the piano, focusing on the song his hands have been dancing around since the middle C note channeled through him like an electromagnetic wave pulsing across a clean radio frequency. He hears Hannibal rise behind him and fiddle something off the wall.

Will mouths the words under his breath and registers the soft exploratory pings of tuning notes before a sultry bass line reverberates beneath the steady current of major chords. He smiles without turning and improvises increasingly complicated embellishments in between the level, pacing blues. They pause together when the music calls for a rest, and Will does glance at Hannibal when that happens because he hadn’t expected Hannibal to actually know the song.

Feeling brave because Hannibal heard him sing before, Will sings, softly, “So thanks for the cheer. I hope you don’t mind my bending your ear, but this torch that I found; it’s gotta be drowned, or it soon might explode.” He turns and looks over his shoulder at Hannibal as he cuts off and sings, “So make it one for my baby and one more for the road.” Hannibal watches him and watches his hands gliding along the keys softly. “Make it one for my baby and one more for the road, that lonely road.”

Hannibal has the strange expression of a man found, and Will is terrified at how urgently it calls on him; it calls on something much deeper beneath the surface. That vague but omnipresent tug demands a strengthening and a dilution, a buzzing in his chest and a weakening in his knees and shoulders.

Will’s phone buzzes on the music stand; the stalled moment in time ripples. Hannibal stands to place the guitar back on the wall, and Will fumbles the phone off the ledge and reads the text.

_No rush, Will. Lecter’s cute._

Another one follows it before he can type a reply.

_I didn’t write that. Beverly stole my phone._

He shakes his head and starts to type, _I’m sure she did._

He forgets his train of thought when Hannibal’s lips press against the side of his neck as naturally and readily as if they belonged there. A happy sigh that he does nothing to hide escapes him and Hannibal licks and nips at his freely offered skin.

“Would you like to go back up to my room, Will?”

The phone sits forgotten in Will’s hand, the text ready to be sent.

He mumbles against Hannibal’s jaw, “Do we have to go that far?”

Hannibal looks at him and then at the armchair against the wall a mere few feet behind them. “I suppose not. You might wish to reply to Abigail first.”

He _says_ that, but he’s already unbuttoning Will’s shirt and dragging him onto his feet. Will makes an incredibly undignified noise like a surprised squawk when Hannibal pulls him into his lap. He scrambles to finish the text, biting his lip in his haste.

_I might not be some for a while dnt urn the shoddy down_

He swears and corrects the typos as best he can what with Hannibal’s lips kissing his collar bone. His teeth scrape at the eager flesh and work steadily lower. Will’s finer motor skills diminish exponentially.

_I might not be home for a while. Don’t burn the house down_

He hits send and drops the phone to kiss Hannibal and moan around the tongue slipping against his. Hannibal whispers, “You’re fantastic when flustered, Will.”

“I hope that’s not the only time you think I’m fantastic,” he breathes. He nearly pops a button on Hannibal’s shirt.

“I enjoy this,” Hannibal murmurs, sliding his hand up Will’s thigh.

“Good, that’s good.” Will takes a warm earlobe into his mouth and sucks. “I like it, too. Fuck, and I like your moan. God, Hannibal.”

His lush smile brushes against Will’s chin.

Hannibal absolutely purrs, damn him, “How much do you like it, Will?”

Over the blood rushing in his ears, Will decides there are worse ways to fall in love with someone. Even if there weren’t, he wouldn’t change this morning with Hannibal; he wouldn't change last night either.

“As much as a D sharp likes an E flat.”

Hannibal’s laugh is vibrations and scattered chords and warmth. Will laughs with him, too giddy not to.

There are worse ways to fall in love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Port Pralines  
> http://www.ecolechocolat.com/chocolate-recipe_wybauw_port.php
> 
> Let It Be by the Beatles
> 
> What a Wonderful World by Bob Thiele and George David Weiss
> 
> Steinway & Sons Concert Grand Piano, Model D, 1901  
> http://www.mdg.de/fluegele.htm
> 
> One for My Baby (and One More for the Road) by Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer


	5. If You Let Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will has more sexy times and consults with females about stuff.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _You don't really understand how it feels to be your man/You're just nice to have around now_

Will slides his hand into Hannibal’s pants and licks at the sweet spot on the side of his neck beneath his jawline. Hannibal sighs softly and combs his fingers gently through Will’s hair, flattening his fingers against his skull when Will squeezes him. Their breaths come hot and fast, and Will is edging back on the armchair in small increments so that his knees land on the floor on either side of Hannibal’s feet before he can stop his course of action. Will opens his pants and takes him into his mouth in one fell swoop, groaning around the taste and the musky smell of him.

Hannibal’s fingers have stayed in his hair and scratch lightly at his scalp as he works him in his mouth, pressing his tongue along the veins he can map out and suckling at the head when he comes up for air. He doesn’t like doing this particularly; what he likes is the element of altruism it brings to the encounter. He enjoys taking care of Hannibal this way, and it’s only the first time, but he doesn’t foresee having any kind of problem doing it again and again.

Will would welcome the opportunity to do this to Hannibal more often, actually, to learn all of his preferences. He picks up a few things already; he notices that Hannibal digs his heels into the floor to keep his hips from bucking when it feels especially good. He likes it when Will tongues beneath the ridge at the very top just beneath the slit. He tries not to show how much he likes it, but it’s pretty obvious, and it makes Will feel dizzy every time he gets that stalled breath reaction out of Hannibal.

He circles his tongue up the length and then takes him in his mouth again, bobbing his head encouragingly. His enthusiasm makes it better for Hannibal, and the better it is for him, the louder he gets. Will could come from that alone, the soft, muted noises Hannibal makes in the back of his throat that come increasingly unfiltered and uninhibited the closer he is to orgasm.

Panting, he says, “Will, I’m—”

Not even allowing Hannibal to finish his sentence, he surges down more forcefully. Hannibal’s thighs tense, his hips jolt minutely beneath Will’s hands, and his hand clenches into a fist in Will’s hair. A heavenly little grunt flutters out of his plump, crimson mouth. Will plans for the trajectory and catches most of it in the back of his mouth, swallowing down the final few beads collected at the very tip when he takes his mouth away. He laps at the shiny head and leans back on his heels contentedly, moving his tongue around the roof of his mouth to explore the briny taste.

Hannibal tends to zipping himself back up and sinks down onto his knees before Will. He pushes him to lay flat on his back. They do the next part without words. Hannibal pulls his pants down to his thighs and sucks him into his mouth quickly, moving at a pace that’s almost brutal on Will but too wonderful for him to suggest slowing down. He thinks he gets it anyway; they don’t have much time left.

He drops his head back onto the floor and strains to watch Hannibal suck his cheeks in and close his eyes. Will groans and takes deep, dragging breaths to stave off the inevitable finish already twisting insistently in his belly. His efforts to calm down and make it last longer fail to count for anything once Hannibal reaches up with his free hand to roll his balls in his palm and tug. The cliff is within his sights now, and he only needs a gentle push to go sailing over the edge. Hannibal’s throat constricts around him.

Will’s body bows. One arm shoots out into the leg of the piano bench; he bunches up the shoulder of Hannibal’s shirt in his other hand, clawing him through the fabric. His body goes slack, hips twitching at the light press of Hannibal’s tongue against him as he licks him clean.

He expels a loud sigh and drops his shoulders and neck tiredly. Hannibal looks after the indecent state of his pants and then comes to sit at Will’s side. He thumbs at the spot on Will’s arm that he banged into the piano bench. He rolls up that sleeve and examines the first signs of an already developing bruise. Will clocks the deep scarlet hue right at the heart of the discolored blotch and then drops his head again, eyes closed and chest heaving still.

Trying to be funny, he says, “I meant it as a compliment.”

He hears Hannibal chuckle. A warm puff of air ghosts across his cheek, and then Hannibal is kissing him, slowly and intentionally. His tongue passes between Will’s lips, and Will sighs, comfortable and comforted by the familiar slick feel of their tongues moving together.

“I should go home and shower, check in with Abigail,” Will mumbles in between leisurely, unhurried kisses. “My coworker is with her; they’re going to grill me like no one’s business.”

“My sister will have heard about you by now, no doubt. I will experience a similar fate.”

“She and your uncle are close?” He moans softly and puts his hand in Hannibal’s hair, tilting his head back to let Hannibal get at his throat.

Sucking a veritable hickey into a low spot on Will’s collarbone, he says, “Emotionally and geographically.”

“So he lives in Baltimore.”

“Seasonally; he and my aunt own a house in Annapolis. They have property in Lithuania and in France as well.”

“Sounds rich,” Will sighs, pulling Hannibal up to kiss him. His arm stings slightly when he bends it. Hannibal notices him wincing.

“We must be more careful in the future not to break you.”

“You haven’t broken me,” Will says, pushing himself to sit up and favoring his left hand on the way up. “I’m a bit more durable than that.” He flexes his arm and bends it experimentally. Hannibal kneads at the inside of his forearm with both thumbs and presses a kiss to Will’s shoulder through his shirt.

“I would hope so,” he murmurs, nipping at Will’s ear and kissing his cheek.

“Hannibal.” Will leans back a little bit, provoked by the turn in their conversation. He bites his lip and studies the single freckle on Hannibal’s cheek he probably got from standing in the sun too long. “What is this?”

Hannibal brushes Will’s hair back from his eyes, cooled with drying sweat. Honestly, he says, “I don’t know how to answer that question.”

“Why not?”

“I’m uncertain of how you feel.”

“Well, how do you feel?”

Hannibal quirks a smile, bringing out the flush in his cheeks left over from earlier. “I would be remiss to not tell you how phenomenal it is to have sex with you.”

Will chortles a loud laugh and looks away, face and neck burning. He says, “It is pretty good.”

“I would also be negligent not to tell you that this is all quite uncommon for me. My sister is the single most important person in the world to me; I wouldn’t introduce you to her if I didn’t feel that there was something different about you.”

Will nods, swallows, and makes himself look at Hannibal, accepting that it’s his turn to be honest. He sports a severe blush all across his face that causes Hannibal’s smile to deepen attractively. He licks his lips and says, “I think I needed as much as I could get from you since I saw you looking back at me through those stage lights.” Hannibal’s eyes soften; he touches Will’s cheek. “I feel drawn in by you, like I couldn’t go back if I wanted to.”

“Four months never seemed like much before,” Hannibal murmurs. He leans in to kiss Will forehead and moves higher to kiss his hair.

“At the risk of sounding like a Dear John letter…” Will clears his throat and hides his face in Hannibal’s neck. “I’ll wait for you if you want me to.” He hears the potential flaw in that statement and revises before Hannibal can respond: “I want to wait for you.”

“I couldn’t ask you to put your life on hold for me.”

“It’s four months,” Will laughs. He pulls away and looks at Hannibal, wavering slightly at the expression on his face. “I…” He loses his breath in the middle of his thought. He’d tell Hannibal that four months will fly by. He barely even remembers the six months after he was shot, but he had been medicated for a lot of that time. He really only remembers passing moments with Abigail at home or seeing Alana when she visited him in the hospital. “It wouldn’t be on hold.”

Hannibal studies him, searching for some kind of tell that Will obviously doesn’t have. He thumbs at Will’s chin and kisses him, satisfied.

He stands and helps Will to his feet before picking up his phone where he dropped it by the armchair and handing it off. Will follows him out of the room into the hallway. Checking to see that he has two unread messages this time, his thumb idles over _View_ button as a thought occurs to him.

Hannibal hands him his jacket from the closet in the foyer and Will shrugs it on as he flips through his contacts. He selects the entry _Hannibal Lecter_ and stills as he looks at the photo.

Will is sound asleep in the picture, his lips parted a little bit and his hair ruffled across his forehead. The sheet has been pulled up neatly around his shoulders from what he can see in the headshot. A tan arm is draped around his front, a chin perched on the curve where his neck meets his shoulder. Hannibal’s face is captured in profile; his lips are pressed to the sharp jut of Will’s jaw.

“Coming, Will?”

He startles out of his staring and looks up as Hannibal emerges from the kitchen with his car keys.

“Yeah. Yes.” He nods, pocketing his phone with the image burned in his mind. He twists his other arm into the remaining slack sleeve and briskly walks out the front door.

Hannibal walks beside him, examining his face. He asks Will, smirking, “What?”

Will catches himself grinning. He shakes his head.

“You’re just very photogenic is all.”

Hannibal, bless him, has the grace to look mildly embarrassed.

“I didn’t think you would be in my presence when you finally saw it.” He unlocks the passenger side door to the gloriously beautiful Chevelle and pulls it open for Will, ever the gentleman. He walks around the front of the car, and Will unlocks the door for him before he can put the key to the handle. He slides into his seat and gives Will a playful glance. “Where am I taking you, Will?”

“I left my car by the club, about a block away.”

Hannibal nods and begins to drive that way, flipping distractedly through stations. He passes through three Classical pieces before deciding on one of Mahler’s symphonies. Will leans back into his seat, fond of the composer and of this particular piece. He hears Hannibal humming under his breath and smiles out the window at the bright autumn sky.

Will talks him through the suburban neighborhood where Beverly’s friend Saul lives and they eventually find the house and unfortunately, Will’s deep blue Crown Victoria, a massively unimpressive mule beside the Thoroughbred of Hannibal’s Chevy.

He stops the car and abruptly leans over to kiss Will right where he sits as he’s pulling the strap of his seatbelt across his chest. Will sighs and kisses him back.

“Dinner at eight?”

“Yeah,” Will says. Hannibal’s hair brushes across his forehead when he nods, a bit jerkily. “Eight is perfect.” He considers what Hannibal said in the studio. “What time do you leave in the morning?”

“The flight is at six o’ clock.”

“Jesus, how are you getting there?”

“I will carpool.”

Will nods and chews on his lip. He doesn’t know what to say, so he peppers Hannibal’s bottom lip with two more swift kisses and then wills himself out of the car into the cool early afternoon air. He bends down to look through the open window.

“Eight o’ clock.”

“We’ll see you, Will.”

He smiles and walks to his car. Hannibal doesn’t drive off until Will is inside and the engine turns over. He waves as Hannibal goes, buckles his seatbelt, and catches sight of Saul walking out into the front yard for the mail. He notices Will and waves, neighborly and kind. Will rolls down the window as he approaches and leans across the seat to hear him better.

“How was the show last night?”

“It was good.” Will smiles noncommittally, knowing full well Saul saw Hannibal drop him off.

“Yeah? Only good?” He winks. Will shakes his head, embarrassed. “Bev said she was heading over to yours a while ago. Have you heard from her?”

“She texted me from Abigail’s phone; they’re probably putting my underwear in the freezer or something.”

Saul cracks a wide grin. He has it so badly for her.

“I won’t keep you then.” 

“Thanks for letting me leave my car here last night, Saul.”

He smiles and says, “Sure, Will. Drive safely.”

Will pulls onto the street and hits the freeway, vaguely listening to the music on the radio but mostly listening to the hum of tires on the asphalt beneath him and of cars racing by around him. He gets home in no time and finds Beverly’s car parked further down on the long stretch of the dirt driveway extending around to the side of the house.

He checks his phone as he’s pocketing his car keys and is happily greeted by the picture Hannibal took while he was asleep. He stares at it again, unable to do much else when he catches sight of it.

He gets out of the car and quickly reads his two text messages as the front door to the house swings open, and a flurry of dogs runs out to meet and smell him. He smiles and pats Simon on the head, offering his hand next to Winston and a few of the others.

“Hey, groupie.” Will looks up into Beverly’s grinning face and blushes furiously enough that his jacket immediately feels too hot. She crosses her arms and walks over to get a closer look at him. In a singsong voice, she asks, “So how was your morning?”

“It was fine.” He pockets his phone and locks the car after shutting the door.

“Just fine? It wasn’t, say, spectacular or wonderful?”

“It was pretty wonderful,” he concedes, fighting the grin threatening to split his face in two. His cheeks burn with it, by how much he can’t stop smiling.

Beverly beams and turns to walk with him toward the house.

“I saw Saul.”

“I should hope so,” she says, looking over her shoulder at his car.

“What are you going to do about him?”

“I don’t know. He’s sort of out of the way.”

“He’s just as far from here as Hannibal is.”

“And you’re entering into a committed relationship with him?” Her tone is teasing, but she stops walking at the slightly mortified expression on his face. She grabs his arm so he’ll turn to face her. “You and him, really?”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“No, I didn’t mean it like—” She huffs a short sigh. “He’s sort of a celebrity, isn’t he? You don’t like that high-profile stuff.”

“I don’t _like_ being investigated by police for nearly being shot to death. I don’t _like_ reporters.”

“From my understanding, people in the limelight tend to get attention from people like that, journalists and the like.” She gives him a look. “Didn’t you say you got approached last night at the bar?” He sighs and scrubs a hand down his face. “You should go for it, though; he’s hot.” She smiles secretively, but it only touches her eyes halfway. “Just be careful you don’t get sucked into the craziness of that lifestyle.”

“Well, I’ve got four months to think about it. He’s leaving for Germany tomorrow.”

She catches the chord of discontent in his voice and doesn’t comment on it. They walk into the house together, and Will looks around for Abigail.

“She’s out back. I think she was trying to get up into one of the trees.”

“Huh.” He gravitates toward the kitchen to wash his hands.

“They grow up so fast. Before you know it, she’ll be begging you to let her get a tattoo.” He looks at her, and she grins. “I guess that happens when dad dates a guy with tattooed fingers.”

He doesn’t correct her for calling him dad, though he wants to. The side door to the kitchen swings open, and Abigail kicks the mud off her boots before stepping carefully onto the mat and stepping out of them. She notices Will and smiles.

She teases him, “I thought we would never see you again.”

“Ha-ha.”

“Are you going to go back out with him?”

Abigail hops up onto the kitchen counter beside Will where he’s perched over the sink, and Beverly leans against the cabinets across from her. Six months ago he led a solitary life with his seven dogs, and now here he was surrounded by women asking to know about his exploits. He could laugh at the irony.

“He asked me to dinner tonight to meet his sister.”

“His tattoo artist sister?”

“Yeah, oh.” He fumbles the business card out of his back pocket, which thankfully didn’t fall out over the course of their morning, and presses it into her hand. “You can decide for yourself if this is what you really want.”

Her eyes are tender when she tears her eyes away from the business card to glance up at him.

“Thanks.”

“Yeah, well.” He fidgets with his hands, awkward in his own skin for being caught in such a rare exchange with Abigail.

“He’s asked you to meet his family?”

He remembers Beverly and meets her eyes.

“It’s his last night in Baltimore.” He shrugs.

She studies him thoughtfully before nodding slowly and looking away. Beverly’s not dense. She doesn’t have to be told that it’s more than just that. She doesn’t need Will to say out loud what she can so clearly read in his face and in his eyes when he lets her look. Her eyes skip down to his shirt and a wrinkle knits across her brow, gaze focusing in on something. Will slaps his hand over his collarbone, scandalized.

“Casanova,” she muses, mouth grinning widely.

“What?” Abigail tries to see what Will is covering with his hand, and he all but runs out of the room.

“I have to take a shower,” he calls out over his shoulder in the way of explaining his sudden departure. He hears them laughing outside the bedroom door and grumblingly rifles through his drawers for some clean clothes. He creeps into the bathroom and starts the water going as he strips off his shirt and undoes his belt, toeing off his shoes as he works on it. He gets an eyeful of the deep purple suck mark left behind on his skin that should have behaved itself and stayed hidden beneath his shirt but obviously exposed itself on the drive over. He shakes his head, swears, and kicks off his pants.

He takes his phone out of his pocket and recalls the two unread text messages. One is from Jack and one is from Beverly.

Jack’s text reads, _I take it you’ll be ready to come back to work soon._

He frowns at the message, confused. Will had been requesting to take his classes back since June, but his doctor hadn’t agreed to sign off on it. She and his physical therapist conspired against him in that way.

Will types back, _You know you have to go through Harris and Ratner before you can even ask me._

He turns off the water, noting the fogged mirror and sends the message. He flicks over to the message from Beverly and it simply says, _You’d think for a teenage girl she’d be better at holding onto her phone_

Will smiles at that, cheered by Beverly’s sense of humor and the scuffle that must have taken place when Abigail fought to get her phone back and then to type a contradictory message before Will could reply. He shakes his head, sets it down on the edge of the sink, and hops into the shower, turning the water on again. It’s scalding from how long he let it run, so he needs to make adjustments. He quickly washes his hair and body and stands under the water for a few minutes longer after he’s finished just to luxuriate in the hot water.

He gets dried off and dressed quickly, taking care to button his shirt enough to cover the offending purpled blotch on his otherwise pale skin. When he leaves the steamy room with his two-day clothes bundled up in one arm and both shoes held loosely in his free hand, he hears Abigail playing her clarinet in a different area of the house behind a closed door. He stands and listens to the whirling notes for a while, appreciating her style, before taking his clothes to the laundry room where he keeps his dirty clothes hamper. He tosses his shoes vaguely into his room.

Will finds Beverly sitting on the couch in the den petting Boyd, the Jack Russell Terrier. He nuzzles into her thigh and yawns theatrically before stretching out on his back and promptly falling asleep. She laughs and looks up at Will.

“Well, I _was_ going to make an artful exit.”

He snorts and lifts Boyd off her and onto the freed up cushion on the other side of him. They lean back into the couch and say nothing for a while.

“Were you hung over at all this morning?”

“I didn’t drink that much.” Will shakes his head.

“I had to make Zeller drive me home. You should have heard him.” Will laughs and scratches Boyd’s belly. His tiny feet kick and he snuffles. “So you and Lecter, you think it could be serious?”

“I hope so,” he blurts out unthinkingly. He doesn’t really regret saying it to Beverly; she’s one of the few people he actually fully trusts. “He seemed…I don’t know, genuine.”

“He’d better be, or I’ll kick his European posterior.”

They laugh jovially at the mental image, or at least Will does, even though he doesn’t like to think about anyone hurting Hannibal for whatever reason. He pinches distractedly at a spot on the inside of his elbow, fingers having migrated there on their own. He crosses his arms over his chest.

“You should meet him next time he’s in town. I think you’d get along.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, you don’t mess around; he would respect that.”

“I like the sound of that.” She shrugs. “I think my calendar’s pretty free in four months.”

He sighs and tips his head back.

“It’ll be fine.”

“No one’s better at waiting than you, Will.” She offers him a supportive smile which he returns. “Do you need me back here for Abigail tonight?”

“Maybe she’ll want to stay at Marissa’s.” He turns to look down the hall where the muffled music wafts out from behind her bedroom door. “I have this persistent feeling like I should take her to dinner tonight.”

“You are allowed to have a personal life, Will. You’ve been holed up in here for six and a half months already. Don’t feel bad for having a few nights out here and there.”

“No, that’s not how I mean it.” He shifts on the couch and turns to face her, pulling one knee up and tucking it underneath himself. “He’s letting me meet his sister, and for him, that’s a really big deal, a huge step in any relationship.”

Beverly nods pensively.

“You’re wondering if you should reciprocate by letting him meet Abigail.”

“It’s crazy,” Will says suddenly. He drops his head and rubs at the back of his beck. “This is crazy. We’re insane.”

“Those reporters weren’t calling the house again, were they?”

He turns and finds Abigail standing in the hallway, sans clarinet. She looks at him curiously, expectantly.

“Uh…”

“Nobody called the house, Abigail,” Beverly answers for him. She raises both eyebrows at him in question when he turns to look at her. “You’ll call me if you need me to come back later tonight?”

“Yeah.” He nods. “Thanks, Beverly.”

“Walk with me?”

He stands, grateful for the excuse to escape the situation if only for a few minutes. Abigail smiles, confused and entertained simultaneously; she steals his spot on the couch and rubs at Boyd’s stomach with both hands. Both his legs kick harmlessly, and he watches her smile and fawn over him before slipping out of the house. He follows Beverly out to her Jeep.

“Do you think it’s a good idea?”

He looks up at the sky. “I don’t think it’s a _bad_ idea. They’d probably get along. I know she wants to meet the sister.”

“It’s your call.” Beverly’s slate Grand Cherokee chirps once when she presses the button on the remote attached to her keys. “Don’t feel pressured because of the time constraints. When he gets back, you’ll have plenty of time to do this, and besides, time might be a good tester. You get to see if Hannibal’s really a good enough guy to introduce to Abigail; Abigail gets to decide whether or not she actually wants a tattoo.” She weighs her hands.

“Somehow I doubt time will change her opinion on the matter.” She gives him a significant, tiny smile, a knowing look sparking in her eyes. He chuckles, rubbing at his chin. “All right, all right, point: Katz.”

She grins and gets into her car. He watches her drive off down the road and waves just before she disappears behind the cover of trees. He looks up at the sky again, speckled throughout with halfway there clouds. A thin streak crosses over the sun. He ducks his head, sighs, and ambles back onto the porch and into the house, some semblance of a decision made.


	6. Sweethearts Together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will and Abigail get a minute to gather their thoughts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Two hearts together as one/Everybody needs someone to tell their troubles to/To share the pain and laughter in a world beset with fools/To help you with your ups and downs/Someone to heal your wounds_

Abigail is on Will’s laptop when he walks back into the house and heads for the kitchen. He asks over his shoulder if she’s hungry, and she doesn’t reply. When he walks back into the den, she hastily closes the laptop and turns to face him where he’s standing behind the couch.

“Beverly brought sandwiches for lunch. I’m good.”

Curious, he inquires, “What were you reading?”

“Oh.” She stares accusingly at the laptop and shrugs. “It was just…”

“Abigail?”

She sighs and bites her lip, considering.

“It’ll upset you.”

He frowns and slowly rounds the couch, giving her time to take the laptop and run, but she stays where she is. She settles in, pulling her feet up onto the cushion beneath her, black and white striped socks peeking out from the legs of her jeans. He sits down beside her and shoots her a wary look; she drops her eyes and swallows.

Before he can reach forward to open the laptop where it rests dormant on the coffee table, she snatches it and cradles it against her chest. “It’s not anyone else’s business what happens in your personal relationships,” she says in one breath.

“I agree,” he replies slowly. “Abigail, whatever it is, if it’s on the web…”

He waits for her to change her mind and hand it over. It takes a moment, and she isn’t happy about it.

She relents, grudgingly, and says, “Only because I don’t want you to find out about it somewhere else.”

“Let me see.”

She surrenders the laptop, watching his face nervously and fidgeting with the sheer scarf about her neck. He spares the pale blue material an empty glance and then diverts his attention to the screen as he pushes it back. The website flashes back to life and Will winces at the headline.

“ _Those Who Can’t, Teach_ , what even…” He scrolls down the page, glancing at the author’s name for all of two seconds before his eyes land on the photo.

_No._

_No, no, no, no._

They’re standing on either side of the door to Hannibal’s shiny black Chevelle just across the street from La Fin Absolue du Monde. Will’s hands, both of them, humiliatingly, are in Hannibal’s hair, and Hannibal’s arm is barred steadily across Will’s shoulders; his shirt is bunched up in Hannibal’s hand at one bicep.

The least and most of his troubles lie in that shared, enthusiastic kiss between their mouths like an inappropriate inch of skin revealed beneath a hiked up skirt or a stain of lipstick on a man’s collar; the scandalous implement foreshadowing and symbolizing intent. More than just intent, it seals that to which he had willingly submitted himself in a very public, very irreversible way.

 _I guess you’ll be coming back to work soon,_ Jack had texted him.

“Oh, God,” he mutters. He pinches his glasses off his nose and rubs at both eyes with his thumb and middle finger. He swallows hard, the laptop lifting out of his lap. He continues mouthing to himself, “God, oh, God.” He catches sight of Abigail quietly closing it again, and he stops her.

“Will,” she says tenderly, making him grimace with intense shame. “It’s not a big deal.”

“What does it say?”

She bites her lip thoughtfully and replies, softly, “Just a bunch of gossip, not important.”

“Wait, let me see that again.” He leans over just slightly, and she turns the laptop so he can view the blog more easily. He scrolls back up to the top of the site and scans the name beneath the entry’s title, an astoundingly familiar name that he can’t quite place. “Written by Freddie Lounds,” he mumbles, tilting his head to one side. He repeats the name, unnerved and unsettled: “Freddie Lounds?”

“She’s not one of the reporters who stalked you when you got out of the hospital, is she?”

“Not sure,” he says, eyes scanning the set-up of the blog itself. The absurd, almost obnoxious text captioning the photos reminds him of tabloid newspapers but in an electronic format.

Abigail keeps the laptop right where he can see it and lets him scroll absently through the article. He picks out phrases here and there, trying to get a sense of the author. He finds one line that shocks his heart and sets his teeth on edge, eyes blurring slightly with the telltale burn of angry tears: _Music instructor Will Graham was hospitalized and given medical leave after a violent altercation with a student’s father, Garrett Jacob Hobbs, ended in tragedy for the girl’s parents._

He stares at the line and swallows hard, eyes tracking to the left and lingering a long time on the artfully placed photo of three, a family photo that he studies blankly without actually seeing the faces. He reads the caption instead: _Will Graham’s student, Abigail Hobbs, and the girl’s deceased parents, Louise and Garrett Jacob Hobbs (2012)._

A warm hand lands gently on his shoulder and squeezes lightly. He sighs shakily and presses his fingers into his temples, leaning back gingerly into the couch and deflating slightly. The laptop finally closes, and he doesn’t reach for it again.

“I thought we’d dealt with the last of all that trash following us,” he whispers, words bereft of any kind of strength. “Abigail, I’m so sorry.”

“No,” she almost snaps at him, firm but endlessly kind in the determined set of her jaw and the soft look in her eyes. “Don’t do that, Mr. Graham; don’t be worried about me. This—this…” She falters, scowling blearily at the closed laptop as if its very nature is offensive to her. “This _crap_ isn’t an attack on what you did when my dad…when…” Her voice breaks, but her resolve remains sturdily intact. “You know it isn’t your fault that any of that happened.”

He doesn’t speak; he doesn’t trust his voice not to go to hell. More than that, he doesn’t trust the muscles in his face not to betray him and give away all the things he’s been hiding deep in his chest since he woke up in the hospital hooked up to hissing machines, feeling halfway dead already but only wishing he was because no one would tell him whether or not Abigail was okay.

“You were just protecting me,” she says, voice quiet in a way that he hates for it to be quiet. “This Lounds person only brought it up because it’s a more interesting read if Hannibal Lecter isn’t the only celebrity in the story.”

“Hannibal,” he mumbles dumbly. Realizing something he hadn’t considered before, he swears urgently and seizes the laptop, alight with a new type of panic. Shaking, he sputters, “Hannibal, oh, my God.”

He scours through it quickly for all the incriminating information he can find that Hannibal is at every liberty to read any time today, tomorrow, or in the near future while he’s half the world away evaluating his decision to be paired off with someone he’s only known for two days. He licks his lips and shakes his head, hands trembling. “Shit, shit, shit.”

His phone buzzes in his pocket with a received text. He ignores it.

“He didn’t already know?”

“Not that he told me.” Will drops his cheek into his palm and skims through the article for every defaming bit of truth he can locate about himself and the incident that occurred six months ago. “He isn’t home very often; he probably wouldn’t have heard about it.”

“Will, he probably won’t care.” She furrows her eyebrows once when he looks at her, his face revealing something desperate and miserable probably at the slight widening of her eyes. She stands and says softly, “I’ll make you some coffee.”

He nods slowly and reads through the rest of the article; it isn’t very long, but it hits all the points and paints a wonderful image of Will as a failed musician-turned- _God damned groupie_ latching onto the successful, well-to-do star that is Hannibal Lecter. Will doesn’t really search for slander aimed at Hannibal, but he notes with an awful sinking feeling that most of the filth is about Will’s tangle with Garrett Jacob Hobbs and the subsequent carnage that followed.

He sets the laptop down and scrunches his fingers against his scalp so he tugs his hair just hard enough to distract him from the cacophony of fear and agitation and dread stirring in him. His phone buzzes again in his pocket, reminding him of the previous text he didn’t acknowledge. He takes the device out of his pocket and feebly opens the first of two text messages, Jack’s reply to his previous fragile, confused ignorance.

_You haven’t seen the article, I take it?_

Will sags into the couch and numbly types out a reply.

_Just now. I have no idea who took that picture or why it seemed worthwhile to them_

The second text is from Zeller, which, although he considers it a little bit strange since they don’t text all that often, is a welcome reprieve from dealing with Jack. He doesn’t know what to expect when he opens the message, and that’s for the best, honestly, even if the few seconds before it shows are tense and horrid.

He’s so caught up in his sense of dread that he doesn’t realize until the message finishes loading that there’s a picture attached. He reads the text before skipping down to look at it.

_She signed my chest!!_

“What in the world…”

Will scrolls down to the picture and taps it with his thumb so it enlarges and fills the screen. He stares uncomprehendingly at the photo of a pretty tipsy-looking Zeller stretching his shirt collar down over his collar bone to reveal a black scrawl of a signature. A tousled blonde, beautiful, Will notes, is in the picture with Zeller. She stands fairly close to his side, giving him an amused, if detached, expression. Price is on the other side of the woman, also looking at Zeller with an entertained, crooked grin on his face. Beverly must have taken it sometime after the show ended since she isn’t in the frame.

Abigail crosses in front of him with two steaming mugs of dark coffee, and Will alerts to the presence of a soft smile on his face. He huffs a low laugh and shows her the photo when she gives him a curious look and sits down beside him on the couch. She takes an unsuspecting drink of her coffee and nearly chokes on it.

She rights herself and takes the phone from Will to study it more closely, lightly shaking her head the longer she looks. Will takes up the laptop, ignoring the sidelong glance it earns him from Abigail. She doesn’t try to stop him or give him his phone back, so he continues his masochistic perusal of the article. He gets about two lines in before Abigail jolts into an energetic, short-lived bout of flailing beside him.

“Oh, I know who that is! That’s, um, Du Maurier, I think? The drummer for Hannibal’s band,” she explains. “She’s awesome.”

Will looks over her shoulder and decides she’s probably right. He didn’t get a very good look at her the previous night, but he does recall seeing a flurry of flying wheat-colored hair behind the aggressive drumming sticks. He swears Robertus said something about a Bedelia being the _beats behind the Lion._

“Would that be Bedelia Du Maurier?”

“Yeah.” She nods excitedly. “That’s her name, Bedelia.”

His phone chimes a few times as he’s starting to tread back into the realm of self-pity right around the end of the first libelous paragraph. He doesn’t snap until about the fourth ring in and discovers Abigail staring at his phone, perplexed but vaguely cheerful-looking.

“Who is it?”

“It’s your boyfriend,” she muses playfully, turning the cell phone so he can see the luminous, high resolution photo of Hannibal kissing him in his sleep. He squawks and takes the phone from her, nearly hurling the laptop to the floor in his haste to stand and retreat to the kitchen with the cell phone.

“Hello?”

He catches his foot on the couch as he’s rounding it to escape Abigail’s muffled laughter in the den. A few of the dogs follow him, curious and maybe a little hungry.

“Will,” Hannibal says, sounding a touch uncertain. His tone makes Will’s stomach twist. “How are you?”

“Good, I’m good.” He navigates to the food bowls in the corner of the kitchen and makes quick work of noisily filling them up so Hannibal can hear that he has a reason not to fret over his silence. Hannibal stays silent throughout, though, and as many dogs as Will has, he doesn’t have enough to drown out the silence stretching between them. Will can’t stand it, so he sneaks out the side door and walks into the yard to look up at the sky and let the breeze take away his nerves. “You saw the article,” Will asks without it being a question.

Hannibal sighs on the other line, as clear an answer as Will needs. He bites the inside of his bottom lip and doesn’t breathe for a few prolonged seconds.

“I get it if you don’t want to see me again.”

“Why wouldn’t I want to see you again?”

Will closes his eyes and runs a hand through his hair, the feel of Hannibal’s hands too vivid and raw and fresh in his mind. He pats Penelope on the head when she comes to nudge curiously at his leg. He just sees Abigail pulling the door closed as Winston comes padding outside to stand watch for him alongside the rowdy Staffordshire terrier mix.

Quietly, he says, “That wasn’t how I wanted you to find out about…what happened six months ago.”

Not unkindly, Hannibal replies, “I am not insensitive to that, Will. The nature of this call was not to interrogate you about matters you clearly aren’t ready to discuss with me.” Will waits, rocking back on his heels and shifting his weight between feet. He watches the grass sway and shiver with a particularly gusty wind. “I meant only to reassure you and see that you were all right.”

There’s a short stuttering silence wherein Will isn’t sure if he should speak or if he should wait for Hannibal to say something, but before he can make up his mind Hannibal begins, almost hesitantly, “It came to my attention that you had endured this type of thing once before, when these events first occurred. My sister, she followed the story.”

“Don’t tell me,” Will murmurs, looking over his shoulder at the house. “She did a Google search.”

He earns a small, modest laugh at that. It relieves him, immensely.

“That she did; she recognized your name and came across that atrociously rude woman’s blog.”

“Woman?” Will reconsiders the spelling of the name, Freddie Lounds. He supposes he should’ve figured. As if to further accentuate his streak of brilliance, his brain provides him with a slightly fuzzy image of a red haired woman extending her hand to him.

_I’m Freddie Lounds._

“Oh.”

 _If you ever want to talk about what happened to you,_ she had said to him in some false sense of camaraderie. _I’d love to get your story._

“Well, damn it.” He frowns and presses the palm of his free hand into his forehead. He sighs, “Damn reporters.”

“She has written about Nemean Lion in the past but never anything this salacious. If it weren’t in such bad taste, I might admire her gall.”

Will hums and gently toes at the mud. “Do you have trouble with taste?”

He can hear Hannibal’s smile when he answers, “My thoughts are often not tasty.” A comfortable beat of quiet passes between them; Will feels better, somehow. “It was never my intention to bring you back into the spotlight, Will. I am sorry for that.”

Will stares blankly at the trees for a moment and then chuckles softly before laughing a little bit louder and taking a deep, much needed breath.

Before Hannibal can voice his confusion, Will explains, “No, it’s just I apologized to Abigail, and now you’re apologizing to me, and I was going to apologize to you, too.” He chuckles and shakes his head. “All this is really just…stupid, isn’t it?”

“I quite agree, yes,” Hannibal says gently, no doubt attempting to gauge Will’s level of truthfulness as best as he can over the phone.

“Is there any way we can just forget about it, for today? Just because…” The words die in his throat, unrealized, but Hannibal doesn’t need to hear the rest, so he figures it’s okay that he can’t say it out loud. Rather than try to recapture his original words, he wearily mumbles, “It’s not worth it.”

“Are you still going to come for dinner tonight?”

“Yeah,” Will rasps, drawing his attention to the constriction in his throat. He swallows and glances back at the house, fear and anticipation burbling beneath his skin. “This is probably premature, but would you be opposed to meeting Abigail if I brought her along?”

“No, Will,” Hannibal breathes, sounding stunned and rightfully so. Will could smack himself. “She is an important part of your life.”

“Yes, she is,” Will concurs softly. “I haven’t asked her, but I was thinking about it, and I thought you should know that I was thinking about it, really thinking about it.” He stammers for a moment, aiming miserably for articulation and not hitting the target at all. “I tried to consult my coworker, who actually didn’t put my underwear in the freezer while she was here, and she was enormously unhelpful.”

Hannibal stifles a laugh on the other line.

“I’m afraid I am rather biased; soliciting my input would be just about as ineffective in helping you decide.”

“What makes you biased,” Will asks with interest, parts of him sparking out of his dreary mindset but much of him remaining rooted in that bleak state of unease he had fought so hard to overcome since returning home with Abigail in tow from the hospital.

“You spoke so highly of her,” Hannibal admits, sounding almost nervous to broach the topic that he had undoubtedly discerned was a highly sensitive one from their limited time together. “I know she is important to you. Introducing her to me, and my sister as well, would be more than a mere gesture of trust and good faith between us; it would affect Abigail as well. I understand why you would want to wait, but I know too well why you would not.”

Hannibal is, after all, allowing Will to meet his beloved sister. Of course he understands; of course he’s biased.

“The thing is I think she probably wants to meet you. That wouldn’t even be the issue.”

“I wouldn’t presume to make this choice for you, Will.”

Will nods his head to himself and takes a breath.

“I’ll be by at eight.” He considers his actions when he walked into the house this afternoon and slid Mischa Lecter’s business card into Abigail's hand. Surely if he could trust her with a tattoo, he could leave it with her to decide all on her own whether this dinner was too much too soon. More confidently than he actually feels, he announces to Hannibal, “If Abigail wants to come along, I’ll let you know as early as I can.”

“I appreciate this, Will.”

He blinks. There’s more behind those words that Hannibal doesn’t say or clarify. He doesn’t need to; much like everything else, it’s clear enough without the added barriers of pragmatics and syntactical rules.

“I’ll see you then.”

“We look forward to it.” He hears a woman in the background with an accent slightly different from Hannibal’s, less sharp in its consonants. Her voice is too far away to distinguish what is being said. “I’m not going to tell him that, Mischa.”

“You are an absolute goose, didysis brolite.”

Will laughs in spite of himself.

“Hey, I like her.”

“Traitor,” Hannibal replies gloomily.

“Okay, I’m going to go, you absolute goose.” He chuckles at the affronted noise Hannibal makes and adds, “I’ll text you about the rest.”

“Don’t rush anything on my part, Will,” Hannibal warns him lightly. Will vocally agrees and they disconnect, craftily, without ever once saying goodbye. He trudges back into the house to find Abigail sitting on the counter by the door again. He stomps his shoes a few times on the rug and steps out of them, beleaguered, when most of the mud clings stubbornly to the soles.

Abigail watches with a funny expression on her face and hands him his coffee once he’s hobbled out of both muddy shoes. He takes it from her, still warm enough to drink easily, and sips twice in his socks and chilled clothes. He hadn’t taken a jacket with him on his impromptu journey outside.

“Very photogenic, isn’t he,” Abigail teases, swinging her legs delicately and giving him a soft, playful glance that melts the last of his icy mood.

“That’s what I said.” His phone buzzes in his pocket and he pats it with his hand, distantly annoyed. He remembers that he never replied to Zeller and sighs, setting his coffee down and leaning back against the counter beside Abigail to read the text.

Jack texts him, _You’re still a somebody in the muckraker community. Harris and Ratner jointly refused to sign off on anything until your next appointment with them. I’m betting they probably know more than a tabloid journalist with a camera phone._

He puzzles over the text for a while and decides Jack is trying to be amenable; not funny or comforting really, but agreeable. It’s hard for Jack to take all that’s happened with grace and not to push too hard where he shouldn’t push at all. He doesn’t have a lackadaisical type of temperament, which Will sympathizes with perfectly as he prefers to keep busy and on his feet, too.

 _Most likely,_ Will texts back. He doesn’t type anything else. Jack is a formal, socially appropriate person; he doesn’t like small talk any more than Will does. He types out a quick belated response to Zeller’s message while Abigail contentedly sips her coffee in silence and continues to swing her legs back and forth, soothing and pendulous in their unbroken rhythm.

_Very impressive. I always wondered when this day would come._

He slips his phone back into his pocket and takes his coffee up again. They wait in mutual companionate silence. It isn’t until Zeller texts him back and he has to set his cup down again that he notices the perfect amount of subtle sweetness in the drink.

“That’s really good, Abigail, thanks.”

She hums as he opens the text from Zeller. “You always like your coffee black with one sugar and no milk when you’re in a mood.” He gives her a questioning glance, and she shrugs. “Yeah, the day we came home from the hospital you had your coffee with one cream and two sugars. The first two or three months of PT you left it black with only one sugar, and then when you said you were going to the club yesterday you had one cream with two sugars.”

“That’s…impressive.” He watches her for a minute. Reaching, probably, he asks, “You wouldn’t happen to know where Kind of Blue disappeared to, would you?”

“It’s not under your bed, is it?”

He stares down the way of his bedroom and sets his coffee down before strolling down the hall, reading Zeller’s text as he goes.

_She liked Price better, though. Idk what his deal is with women, but theyre into him and he doesn’t care. Frustrating_

He smirks and types back as he’s crossing the threshold into his room. Simon follows him in, nosy and quietly protective Burmese Mountain dog that he is.

_Price is subtle. Women never feel pressured or obligated to think of him in a sexual light, so they feel more comfortable around him_

He crouches down beside his bed and peers under. There is a pair of slippers widely spaced apart, a few wisps of dog hair he’ll have to vacuum sometime before the week is through, and a lone gray sock that he thinks he’s probably been missing for a while now. He starts to get up but catches sight of the corner of the album in question jutting out from underneath his dresser. He wouldn’t have seen it if he hadn’t been looking horizontally, submerged as it is in shadow. He coaxes it out carefully with a pen and sets it reverently on the shelf in the corner of the room so he won’t lose it again.

Abigail has migrated to the kitchen table, which he slightly prefers since it puts them on even ground and he can see her face better when sitting directly across from her.

“Did you find it?”

She slides a refilled mug of steaming coffee across the table. He acknowledges the slightly tinged paler brown and smiles before taking a sip. It’s spot-on in creamer to sugar ratio, of course.

“It was under the dresser. I must have knocked it down and then kicked under doing laundry or something.”

Abigail nods, watching him drink his coffee and drinking her own. She looks so adult when she does this, when she pinpoints aspects of Will’s day-to-day life and brings them to light in increasingly nonchalant, but always compassionate, ways. She had done that the day they met, too, weeks before Zeller referred her to him. He had been in the process of acclimatization, new and screaming pink like an infant to the transfer from Arlington to Woodbridge that he didn’t want or particularly benefit from.

But there she was every morning when he went in waiting for Zeller to get rid of the one insufferably early morning student with the overbearing parent who insisted on being there to chaperone and critique him as the hour wound down. And there was Will, shuffling awkwardly with a briefcase too full of sheet music and a clarinet safely shielded from the world at his side for the first lesson of the day, a soprano to contrast with her Bb soprano.

It seemed fateful sometimes that they had met that way and had been casually going over music when Zeller one day happened upon them discussing Copland’s Clarinet Concerto and had the idea to put the two of them together more officially as student and tutor.

Zeller and Will aren’t close outside of the occasional drunken outing, but he’d opened this door for Will; he’d given him someone to look after and who looked after him just as well if not better at times. If Zeller hadn’t been so busy Tuesday mornings and if he hadn’t had to start with that one student and his mule headed mother that frustrated him so much, maybe all of this would have been different; how things would have differed, though, he has no idea.

Will isn’t sure he wants to find out, ever, what their lives could have been if any single event that propelled them together had been different, and it’s horribly selfish and maybe even a touch cruel, but it’s the honest-to-God truth. He can’t battle with himself about things that are true just like he can’t battle with himself about things that occur freely in nature, so he pushes those thoughts away where they will never have any sort of pull on his stream of consciousness again. It would hurt Abigail if she knew; it hurts Will, even as it does a little to comfort him.

“Listen, I wanted to ask you something,” he starts, trying to project a calm that doesn’t currently inhabit him at the level that he’s shooting for. She meets his eyes expectantly, and he blanks momentarily, mind reeling to recall where he left his glasses.

 _On the coffee table in the den,_ he thinks dismissively, focusing again on Abigail. His phone buzzes in his pocket, but he leaves it.

“Hannibal asked me to have dinner with him tonight, and his sister’s going to be there.” Abigail nods quizzically, unassumingly. His heart clenches minutely at that, how she doesn’t expect to be included in the outing and is completely fine with that.

“I can call Marissa. She’ll probably be able to come over later.”

“No, actually—well, I mean, yeah, if you want to stay here with Marissa that’s perfectly fine,” he manages to say after much stammering and many more unnecessary pauses. “But you’re welcome to come along.”

The mild surprise on her face makes him want to run, kind of like a knee-jerk reaction, but he stays put, firmly decided on giving her a chance to consider and respond however she chooses without having to worry about how her answer will affect him.

She asks, in a tone that is very difficult for him to decipher, “Really?”

“He and his sister both are okay with it, and I have mixed feelings because I know how ridiculous this must seem with how we just met last night, and now this blogger business with Lounds, and—”

“I want to go.”

“You—yeah?”

“You’re asking if I want to meet the very talented, very European saxophone player of a pretty cool band and his equally talented, equally European tattoo artist sister who might do my future tattoo. Is that an accurate summary of what you’re offering?”

Will opens his mouth, closes it, and nods wordlessly. Abigail cracks a small smile.

“Not to mention you care a lot about the guy, and he obviously thinks you’re pretty nice, too, what with letting you meet his sister in the first place.” She looks down into her coffee, takes a sip, and gives him a wide smile that he’s sure he hasn’t done anything lately to merit. “Plus, I get to scope him out, see what all the fuss is about.”

A smile tugs at the corners of his mouth, and he scoffs a quiet laugh into the lip of his mug before taking a long drink of the sweet, warming coffee.

“When do we need to leave?”

“Seven, so we’ll make the drive in time.”

She nods and drinks her coffee.

“Do you think they’ll like me?”

“You might have a bit of a head start, honestly.”

A genuinely pleased expression flits across her face, and Will returns it unthinkingly. His eyes flick to the den momentarily, and he recalls the article again with a stab of regret and old, dulled pain. She catches his spirits wilting and nudges his socked ankle with her socked toes.

“Everything’s going to turn out fine.”

“Would be a nice plot twist, wouldn’t it?”

The small smile he bares takes a colossal effort to muster up, yet he knows it falls short of what he had intended. Abigail smiles back, just as small, conscious, and maybe even a tad more defiant than Will’s.

“Yeah, it would.”

They sit in the kitchen, the midafternoon sun coming in through the windows and tinting the tile a soothing orange. Winston wanders back into the house when Will lets him in from outside, and he goes immediately to Abigail’s side and promptly falls asleep as soon as his head touches solid ground. They laugh every now and then at the things the dogs do, and sometimes Abigail asks Will to describe to her what he knows about Hannibal. They are both pleasantly surprised at just how much Will brings to the table.

He tells her that Hannibal possesses a natural proclivity for music and that he adores his sister but that his relationship with his aunt, Robertus’ wife, is somewhat strained for an as-yet unidentifiable reason; he tells her about the many languages Hannibal speaks, but not how he found out about four of them, and he goes on excitedly about Hannibal’s tattoos, which Abigail pays special attention to, though she had been listening attentively throughout.

The sun creeps through the sky, and it’s nearly four when Abigail rises to wash their mugs in the sink. Will takes out his phone and quickly texts Hannibal of Abigail’s acquiescence to go to dinner with them. That task completed, he goes to the unread message from Price and reads it.

_We probably shouldn’t enable him, but Brians more fun than my kids lately life is full of tough decisions_

Will smiles at Price’s pretty accurate description of friendship with Zeller. Another text from Price pings through.

_Speaking of which, you and Lecter is that OK?_

He idles with his thumbs over the touch screen, a warmth spreading through his chest and down his stomach. He starts to type something without really thinking it through when a text from Hannibal comes in. Will smirks at the photo of them that Abigail had seen and scandalized him with.

_In that case, we will prepare accordingly. Thank you, Will. –H_

Will grins and goes back to Price’s message. He types back, _It’ll turn out fine, I think_

He smiles, more easily now, at Abigail when she emerges from the kitchen. They go out to the backyard after stepping back into their shoes and watch the dogs run and jump, a few of them, Madeline specifically, getting absolutely filthy in the process. It’s a nice day out, and the evening that rushes up to greet them with the setting sun is in keep with it, sending them a clear, opaque teal sky that Will feels he can almost see through into the rest of the universe.

Abigail stares up at all that blue with him, and it’s as peaceful and as grounded as he’s felt in months. He doesn’t say that; he doesn’t need to because they both finally have that precious, balanced calm they have so long coveted but could never find.

He thinks she was probably waiting for him to be happy again and that he was probably waiting for someone to lure that happiness out of him, maybe with music the way Hannibal had done.

 _No,_ he corrects. _Exactly with music, exactly Hannibal._

He watches the first stars bud into luminosity with Abigail and checks the clock on his phone. They have a few minutes more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nicked with good intentions from Bryan Fuller’s Hannibal: “Do you have trouble with taste?” “My thoughts are often not tasty.” 
> 
> Didysis brolite – big brother, w/ brother as a diminutive
> 
> Aaron Copland’s Clarinet Concerto  
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmMFL1zZ-tU


	7. Can You Hear The Music?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abigail and Will dine with the siblings Lecter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Sometimes I'm dancin' on air, but I get scared, I get scared/When I hear the drummer, get me in the groove/When I hear the guitar, makes me wanna move/Can you feel the magic floatin' in the air?_

Abigail adores the big house and the huge lawn straight away, if her wordless appraisal is anything to go by. They pull up into the neatly maintained driveway in Baltimore about ten minutes early, and Will is a bit beside himself about what the proper thing to do would be. He considers whether dinner will be ready or if he’ll surprise Hannibal or if they were expected to be early…

His thoughts are still running away from him when he hears Abigail’s seatbelt unclick and then her car door swinging open. He snaps himself out of it in time to see her skipping up to the doorstep and jerks out of his contemplative stupor. He fumbles with the buckle of his seatbelt, bumps his head on the roof, and falls out of the car to stop her before she can rap at the door and completely blindside him. She gives him a curious side glance.

“They invited us, didn’t they? They’re not going to be offended that we’re a little early.”

“Let’s just…how do I introduce you, or do you want to take care of that yourself?” He fidgets with his jacket, more than minutely out of sorts. Abigail continues to watch him with an entertained look on her face.

“My, you’re nervous.”

“I’m not.” He shakes his head unconvincingly. She smiles at him, all teeth and shining eyes. Firmly but still without much conviction, he says, “No, I’m not. It’s just that I don’t know what to call you. I’m not nervous.”

She doesn’t believe him, but he supposes that’s an uphill battle and not a very important one anyway.

“You don’t have to call me anything. Tell them I’m your student.”

He sighs, “You haven’t been that for almost seven months.”

“Well—”

The door opens and throws the light from inside the foyer indiscriminately over them. Will blinks and faintly catalogs their current location as Hannibal’s doorstep. He would kick himself if the action wouldn’t make him even more of a spectacle to behold.

He is somewhat grateful that it isn’t Hannibal holding the door open, but his absence can only mean the woman in his place is his sister. She smiles warmly at Abigail and then at Will. Her smile is Hannibal’s.

“You must be the one making my brother so crazy,” she muses with a brilliant cheeky grin to rival Abigail’s.

He hears Hannibal chidingly call his sister’s name from the direction of the kitchen. Mischa beams over her shoulder and then waves Will and Abigail into the house. They follow her inside and hand off their jackets when prompted, though Will attempts to object and take the duty over for himself. The woman, ash blonde, svelte, and tattooed down the lengths of both arms, quietly dismisses him and then reaches out to finally shake his hand.

“There’ll be none of that, myli. I’m Mischa, as I’m sure you’ve guessed.”

He smiles and gives his name in turn. Her grip is strong and steady, skin warm. “Will Graham.”

“And this gorgeous darling; you must be Abigail.”

“It’s nice to meet you.” Abigail ducks her head and smiles politely, if slightly embarrassed. Will is grateful he won’t be the only point of entertainment for the siblings tonight, though he won’t say as much aloud lest Abigail actively turn it all back on him.

At that precise moment, Hannibal emerges from the kitchen wearing a white apron around his lower half. Will has never been so simultaneously relieved and alight with nervous energy. He can at least admit it to himself how nervous this evening has him feeling even if he couldn’t confess to it in so many words. He would rather not be fidgety or afraid of whatever tonight has in store for him, but he can’t really force himself to feel any other way.

“Hello, Will.” Hannibal strides confidently toward the three of them. Will worries for a moment he might kiss him in front of Abigail and his sister, but he merely touches Will’s arm and offers a stunning smile. He turns his attention to Abigail and reaches out to take her hand. He says, softly, “And Abigail.”

“Hi.” Will takes a moment to appreciate her bravery and compassion for coming with him tonight when she was certainly under no obligation to do anything of the sort for him. She is full of wonders and talents and beautiful, generous kindness. “Thanks for having us over tonight. It smells really good, whatever it is.”

Mischa laughs, affectionately touching the back of her brother’s neck with one hand. She winks and teases, “He goes all out when he wants to impress his guests.”

“You are a guest as well,” Hannibal reminds her in the tone of an older sibling delicately reprimanding a younger sibling. It’s very apparent to Will now, where it hadn’t been so obvious previously, that Hannibal has filled the role of protector and provider for this woman, once a child, for the bulk of his life going back as far as he can recollect. There’s something sweetly endearing about the image of Hannibal as a younger man, as a boy, looking after someone who always was the entire world to him and could never be anything less than.

Hannibal’s fingers graze the back of Will’s hand as he gestures for him and Abigail to follow them into the dining room where the table has been set but for their meal. Hannibal walks elegantly around the head of the table and pulls the chair out for his sister as she sits. He stands with his hands on the back of his own chair and waits until Will and Abigail have taken their seats to ask, “What are we drinking tonight?”

When his eyes fall to hers, Mischa answers easily, “Chardonnay, Hannibal; the Yellowtail if you have it.”

He nods once and looks expectantly to Will and then Abigail.

“Just water for me, please,” Abigail replies.

“Yeah, water’s fine.”

“Are you certain? I have a fine selection of wines from which to select.”

Will’s face heats, though Mischa is quietly telling Abigail a joke of some kind about swans over the corner of the table. Calmed by the intent behind the distraction and by Abigail’s soft chuckle, Will relaxes slightly and doesn’t start when Hannibal places a warm hand on his shoulder.

“Whatever you’re having then; I’m not picky about wine, and I have to drive later.”

“Of course, Will.” He smiles and goes on his way. Mischa twirls a long-tined fork in one hand and observes Will the way a scientist observes a newly discovered plant species. He looks up and catches her smiling warmly at him, unabashed and carefree in a way that Hannibal really isn’t, though Will suspects this woman could coax it out of him if she felt so inclined.

“You’re very handsome,” she muses bluntly. Her eyebrows twitch upward once, slightly embarrassed but only slightly for having broken the convention of subtle niceties. “Hannibal told me how you met, at Gehry’s club.”

“In the middle of their set.” Will attempts desperately, heroically, not to sputter. Abigail grins down at her place setting.

“Unlike Hannibal,” Mischa says, sounding faraway but highly invested in the secret halfway divulged. She doesn’t expand on it but looks toward the kitchen to where Hannibal disappeared a short minute ago. She stands to her feet, still wearing her smile that looks more tired than cheerful in movement. “Silly berniklitė, my brother.”

She trots off the way Hannibal went, and Will puts his face in his hands.

“Oh, God, she hates me.”

“What are you talking about?” Abigail turns in her chair to look at him, a small frown curving her mouth at the edges. “She’s probably just trying to figure out if she can trust you not to hurt her brother. Give her a chance; she’ll change her mind. How could she not?”

Will smiles at her confidence. Abigail has that way about her that she believes in the people she cares about infallibly. It’s contagious, he has to admit. Someone else has probably had that kind of faith in him before, but that it comes from her now in spite of all that they’ve been through warms him immeasurably. Some shuffling comes from the kitchen, and Will lets the makings of his reply die on his tongue.

Mischa brings in a pitcher of water for Abigail’s empty glass immediately followed by Hannibal carrying three plates of steaming food. Will’s mouth waters, though he doesn’t know what it is yet. From a cursory inspection it looks like some kind of chicken covered in herbs and olives and an assortment of things that smell delicious.

Hannibal smiles as he sets Will’s plate in front of him. Mischa disappears into the kitchen a second time, presumably for the wine.

“Chicken Marbella and a side of baby bok choy with cashews,” Hannibal says modestly. He ducks his head slightly when Will gives him an open, amused expression at the formal announcement of their dinner. Before Will can think to say anything moderately clever, Hannibal turns to receive the two bottles from his sister who turns to slip into the kitchen again for Hannibal’s plate. He pours her glass first, the pale yellow liquid shining brilliantly as if it were boiling beneath that placid surface.

“Please,” Hannibal tells Abigail, gesturing to her plate. She takes up her fork, gives Will a questioning look, and takes a bite when Mischa comes back into the room. To Will, Hannibal names the dark wine as it pours into his round, pristine glass. “Bordeaux: Verite Le Desir, 2008.” Will watches the deep red as it rises and fills the glass halfway.

Reclaiming her seat and taking up her glass, Mischa murmurs, “Bon appétit.”

Will samples the wine cautiously, knowing full well what happened the last time he drank wine too quickly at a Christmas party a few years back. It’s fruity and has the dry pull of licorice to it that Will likes immensely.

Hannibal speaks at his place across from Abigail and at his sister’s right hand. Will eats as he listens, stealing a few seconds to close his eyes and sigh around the tastes of garlic, oregano, and sweet vinegar cooked into the flesh of the chicken. He doesn’t look up to check, but he can hear it in Hannibal’s voice that he hasn’t missed Will’s little display.

“Mischa has worked as a tattoo artist for twenty one years.” Hannibal is watching his sister when Will brings himself to make eye contact or at least appear engaged in the conversation. “And you painted from the moment you could hold a brush until you could be trusted with a needle and ink.”

“My first commission wasn’t given out of trust so much as it was meant to be a prank, but,” she muses, “I was too good to ignore after that first stolen opportunity. They have never been able to stop me since then.”

Abigail beams at the woman, clearly besotted with the allusions being made to her talent. Will sips at his wine and hopes he doesn’t look quite as dainty as he feels. Mischa and Hannibal take small sips, too, though, so he tries not to worry so much about it and instead focus on the tattoos occupying the skin of Mischa’s thin, strong arms. She wears a white sleeveless blouse with a finely pressed collar. A vivid red stain of ink, Will supposes it is ink anyway, shows from beneath the sheer, transparent fabric loosely draped over her collar bone. The rest of the shirt and the collar are solid white.

He hasn’t even asked yet what sort of tattoo Abigail means to get. Looking at Mischa’s sleeves he feels a flutter of fear that he may have given Abigail his blessing to cover herself completely in tattoos. He would support her if she chose to do it, but he can’t help that protective need to shelter her from things that may alter who she is, physically or emotionally. There has already been so much that he failed to keep her safe from. It must be a father’s eternal conflict that he could never completely protect his child from danger or change.

But then, really, Garrett Jacob Hobbs was a difficult act to follow in some respects. In others, well, at least Will would really have to screw up to look that bad. He takes a bite of salty, gritty bok choy and shakes his head to himself. He shouldn’t make it his mission to lead by comparison. Living his life that way in the past had always lead to someone, usually him but sometimes the people he loved, too, getting hurt and badly so.

Abigail pokes his ribs, and he jolts out of his thoughts. Mischa asks him with a poorly concealed smile, “Do you paint at all, Will?”

His face burns, and he shakes his head more pronouncedly this time. “No, music’s my thing. Abigail does, a bit. Did you tell her?” He looks at Abigail and hides the frown tugging at his lips when he sees her dropping her hand from the pale pink scarf around her neck.

“It’s not my forte,” she dismisses the statement casually, gracefully. Will would really have to start taking his cues from her. Will has never quite known how to shrug off unsafe discussion topics or skirt compliments when he wanted to hear them the least. Abigail’s excellent at driving a conversation. She knows she is. “Unless I have a starting point, I never know what to do with it; all that color and empty space.”

“That emptiness is a volume in itself, numylėtinite. This world is colors and emptiness. When you paint, even the blank spaces carry weight and power.” Mischa leans in toward the table, a mischievous, conspiratorial gleam in her bright green eyes. “Have you experienced this sensation; created something outside of yourself that was more than symbols and more than mere logic could explain?”

Abigail swallows once and drops her eyes to the table before looking up at Hannibal and then at Will. She doesn’t let him go, so he doesn’t let go either.

“Do you remember that seascape I painted, the second week we were back from the hospital?”

It was her first painting, and she hadn’t wanted to do it. She wouldn’t have at all if her therapist hadn’t gone so far as to write it at the bottom of her script for penicillin. The pharmacist had commented about it, and incensed, Abigail had taken Will’s car to the nearest craft store and bought a beginner’s kit with the last bit of money in her wallet. She had kept it boxed up the first week and opened it on a Wednesday; all Thursday she had painted, and all of Friday, too. She had splattered her clothes with specks of yellow and orange and tracked a steady trail of blue in the hallway from her new bedroom to the bathroom.

“I wish you hadn’t sold it,” he says softly, remembering the passionate cuts of red sunlight that arched over the tumultuous waters. It marked one of five eventual paintings Abigail created before the kit ran out and all she had left were three individual tubes of higher quality paint covered in dried flakes of ochre, burgundy, and cyan.

Abigail takes to her glass of water rather than answer him, and Will sees the way Hannibal and Mischa assess her. Robertus had said it enough: _the modesty’s always a dead giveaway in the quieter ones._

Will polishes off the the chicken Marbella and tips back the last bit of earthy, dry wine. It leaves a soft taste on his tongue and on his lips. It occurs to him that Hannibal’s lips would be sweet with it, too, and he grieves for the first time over the course of this dinner that he can’t reach him and put their mouths together. He feels slightly empty with it. Their company tonight extends to the two most important people they each have in their lives at present. He can’t rightly expect to just be able to whisk Hannibal away somewhere and jump him.

Hannibal throws his napkin down over the remaining bits of food on his plate and sighs softly at his place beside his sister. As if he detects the stress coming in waves off both Will and Abigail as the meal has come to a close, Hannibal asks, “Dessert?”

The inquiry provides relief. Will doesn’t want to go home yet.

“Hannibal made sorbet,” Mischa coos warmly over Hannibal’s glass of Bordeaux before taking a long drink. “He’s quite the genius in the kitchen.”

“How do you make sorbet?” Will asks, piling Abigail’s dish on top of his and then handing them off to Hannibal when prompted.

“In this particular case, I used honeydew and sugar, among other things.” Hannibal smiles secretively at him and then gives Mischa a glance over Will’s shoulder. “Will you please take them outside, sister?”

“Yes, darling brother.” She curtsies with a flourish and finishes off Hannibal’s glass. Will hadn’t noticed before, but a sliver of the red creeps out toward her shoulder from beneath the straight line of her white shirt. One of the tattoos on her left forearm is a wispy rendition of the Hermit done in dark blue, seaweed green, and smudged gray. She leads them through the kitchen toward a backdoor, and Will hangs back. Abigail and Mischa go silently out the door without waiting for him to follow suit.

Hannibal walks into the kitchen a moment later, unsuspecting and carrying a great many things between both his arms. He spots Will, freezes for a moment, and then continues toward the counter to deposit the stacked plates, balanced glasses, and piled pieces of silverware.

“You worked as a server through college, right? Because that is the only way this,” Will muses, gesturing at Hannibal’s seamless grace. He continues, “Makes any kind of sense.”

Hannibal watches him for a moment as if he’s unsure as to how he should act when alone with Will; as if he doesn’t know perfectly well how to be alone but not alone at all with Will. It’s probably due, in some part, to the presence of other people just outside: people who matter to them and who have every idea what they might get up to if left unchaperoned in each other’s company for too long.

“Did you wish to go home, Will?”

That soothing, comfortable warmth trickling through his chest seeps into something cold and awful for a single, nervous moment. In the next it becomes a more manageable emotion, a reaction more strongly resembling confusion than fear.

“No,” he says softly. Hannibal doesn’t look convinced, so Will takes a leap and assumes Hannibal isn’t asking because he wants Will to leave. “No, that’s…I want to stay.”

“She can be very honest,” Hannibal says as he starts in on the dishes. Will steps closer and hovers at his side to watch the soap bubbles swirl down the drain. Will presses his lower back against the edge of the counter and listens to the water run, steady and consistent and pacifying. He closes his eyes and hums around it hearing music somewhere in between the uneven staccato of silverware dinging the sides of the basin as Hannibal washes them. The scrapes are soft and few, but there are enough of them for Will to hear that Hannibal is nervous about the whole thing. Maybe his hands even shake a little bit; maybe his heart races slightly in his chest.

Will can’t really help himself when it comes to rhythms and the secrets to and from which they navigate only the most careful of listeners. He can’t help it that he’s always been one of those seekers of accidentally given song. Hannibal is singing to him now as clearly as if he had a guitar in his hands rather than dirty plates disconnected from his skin by the passage of warm water and sharp lemon dish soap.

He doesn’t start when Will slides his left hand solidly across his sternum and holds, neither implicative nor questing. He knows exactly what he intends to find there, and he isn’t disappointed. The thrumming beat there quickens from a ritenuto to a mild stringendo. The dull clangs of knives and forks stop, and the rush of water stops. Hannibal’s fingers slip over his and hold, and the beat skips once on its way back down to a calando tempo before settling there and remaining as constant and tranquil as the whisper of a cool breeze through the air. His skin on Will’s is wet and pulsing with residual heat from the water.

“What happened to you is awful,” Hannibal murmurs softly, voice free of too much sympathy for all that he can guess how Will would feel about it. “I can’t imagine what it has been like for you to make your world Abigail’s as well; how you may have fought over the circumstances that brought you together.”

Hannibal really does know Will too well. He predicted that Will would be the more bothered of the two of them over the unsightly news coming to light about where he had been and what he had done to come out of it alive.

“She tried really hard to be okay with me, in the beginning.” Will sneaks his hand out from underneath Hannibal’s and pulls their hands down to their sides so he can hold him more easily. “Some days I took it a lot harder than she did. She’s stronger than me in a lot of ways. Maybe you wouldn’t know it to look at her, but…” There is no shortage of memories Will has stored in his mind of their first few days together back from the hospital when she had wanted to go home but couldn’t: all the mugs and glasses and plates and bowls smashed to pieces, the increasingly elaborate ways she found to throw the two dozen personal effects she had brought with her across her new bedroom, the fact that having seven dogs had never helped him gain a person’s trust more than it did with Abigail.

“She is a survivor,” Hannibal fills in for Will. He squeezes Will’s hand in his. Will nods and takes in a shaky breath. “On the one hand, those who survive brutal crimes can feel that something crazed and inhuman has been unleashed within them.” Hannibal steps around Will and moves his hands to Will’s hips and around the curve of his back. Where his hands touch Will’s body his shirt presses cool and wet against his skin. “But on the other, Will, you must know that these emotions can be expressed and rerouted in surprising, often artistic ways.”

“Like painting, you mean.” He drops his head slightly to study Hannibal’s collar and thumbs distractedly at the spot beneath the pale violet material where the feathers of the peacock lay permanently fixed to his skin.

“Or like music, Will.”

Hannibal’s eyes are soft when Will looks up.

“It wasn’t my tragedy,” he whispers.

“Wasn’t it?” Hannibal unwinds his right arm from around Will’s waist to place his hand over the ruined flesh beneath one clavicle. “Isn’t it,” he corrects without the proper inflection for a question. “Doesn’t it plague you every day that you had not spared her even a portion of this suffering?”

Will’s eyes fall to Hannibal’s arm at the juncture of elbow and humerus. He doesn’t touch. He doesn’t have to for Hannibal to see that he understands he is speaking from painful experience rather than some distant philosophy.

A curt knock sounds at the backdoor, and Abigail peeks carefully inside after giving them a few moments to untangle themselves from each other, though they hadn’t been doing anything particularly indecent but just touching. Abigail smiles softly at Will before turning her gaze on Hannibal. The soft expression doesn’t fall from her face.

“Mischa wanted me to tell you that I know about the woodblock prints and that if you don’t bring the sorbet out soon she’ll start telling me the really embarrassing stories, starting with something about an ant preserved in amber?”

Will frowns and looks to Hannibal for an explanation only to find Hannibal making a very strange face. He looks like he can’t decide between terror and incredulity but has settled on terror for the most part. One of his eyebrows twitches once.

Calmly, Hannibal tells Abigail, “Please inform my sister that they will be brought out shortly.” Abigail starts to duck out but stops when Hannibal changes his mind. “No, you are my guest, not a messenger between siblings. I will tell her.” He grumbles to himself as he opens the door, “Mano mylimas sesuo.”

Abigail watches the door silently for a few seconds before turning on Will with a secretive smirk. “You want to hear about the woodblock prints?”

He does very much want to hear about the woodblock prints, whatever the hell those are.

“Better not,” he muses back, leaning on the counter. “So what do you think?”

“She’s interesting. I don’t know what he is yet.”

“I’m not sure I do either,” he confesses, some of Mischa’s honesty and Abigail’s general rule of apprehensiveness rubbing off on him simultaneously.

“But I didn’t know about you right away either,” she says casually as if she isn’t actually saying countless other things on top of just that statement on its own. “And you turned out okay.”

He swallows hard and tries very hard to look at her but doesn’t quite make it. She reaches for his wrist and holds. They remain locked in like that for a few peaceful seconds before she notices his shirt is wet around his sides and along his back. His shirt is dark enough that the wet splotches shouldn’t be so visible, but she can feel the cold of it brushing against her hand, so of course she has to ask except she doesn’t. She just raises one expressive eyebrow at him.

Will huffs a laugh and shrugs with the shoulder not connected to the arm she continues holding.

“We were talking about you.”

“I’m flattered?”

“What? Oh!” He sputters and tries to take his arm away, only indignant on the surface of himself. She’s smiling at him, though, so he doesn’t hold onto it for very long. He smiles small and says, “He’s impressed by you, you know.”

“He’s impressed with you, too,” she teases. “A little _more_ than impressed, but well…”

“Stop it already,” he mutters, though they’re both grinning outright. The door opens, and Hannibal walks back in as composed as ever—except for the four or five seconds before he left to speak to his sister. Abigail doesn’t release Will where her hand has migrated to the back of his. Her fingers are warm and gentle.

“It will be just a moment now,” Hannibal says, walking around to finish the last of the dishes. Abigail heads for the door and tugs on Will’s arm in question. He nods and waits for her to slip outside again before striding up to Hannibal and taking that kiss that he’s been daydreaming about since Hannibal left him sitting in his Crown Victoria outside Saul’s house. Hannibal smiles against his lips and kisses him back, but it remains tame and delicate.

Will hums and pulls away. He walks briskly out into the cool late evening air, and Mischa makes her way to him. She catches his arm before twirling away into the house to rejoin her brother. For a long moment she only stares at him, merciless but also kind in the very specific brand of unforgiving perception she possesses and has probably always possessed. She is her brother’s sister after all, and Hannibal houses something like it of his own, something that instructs him of the precise ways in which he might influence and lead a person—but only if that person chooses to be influenced or lead.

Mischa smiles and bites her lip, carefree and perhaps just a touch reckless in her assessment of him and all that it means. She looks over his shoulder and says, “I know you’d protect that one to your dying breath, and I know that’s rare.” Her eyes are bright, and her cheeks flushed with the slight chill brought on by the approaching nightfall. “I know she was little more than a stranger to you when you took her in and she had every reason to despise you and you to despise yourself, though they may not have been the best reasons.” She shrugs minutely and licks her lips. “My brother’s that way, fiercely loyal when he chooses to be but the commander of a snake’s fangs when it’s demanded of him.”

Without having taken offense to her words, he asks, “Are you saying I’m a snake?”

“I’d say more of a mongoose than a snake: a wonderful oddity of nature, one of my absolute favorites.”

She’s pleased by him for all that he can tell. She likes him. She _approves_ of him.

Wary of the answer he might earn with such a question, he asks, “Wouldn’t that make me dangerous to your brother?”

“Hannibal has had his fair share of other snakes, Mr. Graham; even a few rabbits and finely plumed birds. He needs someone he _can’t_ devour. A serpent is a creature that will eat its own tail for lack of anything better to consume.”

“Ourboros,” Will states matter-of-factly. Her smile widens that much more.

“Yes,” she says, taking her hand away. “You really are quite handsome, you know. Sometimes Hannibal favors unattractive men. He can be very tedious.”

Will barks out a laugh. Her honesty is new and upbeat. She winks at him once before finally stepping into the house and leaving him alone again with Abigail. He goes with her to lean his elbows onto the deck railing and look out at the massive yard.

He asks her, “Are you cold?”

She shakes her head and says, “No.”

They wait together in semi-darkness; the trees whir softly with insects. She nudges his side softly with her elbow and smiles. He smiles back, and it’s strange to think that this moonlit world of extravagant food, strange siblings, and art has become their life.

 _And it has become our life,_ Will thinks with a curious clarity he hasn’t felt in a long time.

“Do you think she’ll do the tattoo?”

“You haven’t asked?”

Abigail hums her response. He suspects Abigail isn’t actually asking about whether Mischa will take the commission or not as it is pretty clear how intrigued she is by Abigail; how taken in she and Hannibal are by her curious talents, her pain, and her horrible past; by her relationship with Will and how it could not have always been this easy and this complementary.

“We’ll see what happens in four months,” he says softly.

“We have to get through tonight first,” she teases, matching his tone and his volume. He nods his head a few times.

“Tonight,” he sighs, looking up at the dark navy sky. Abigail could probably paint its equal if she chose. He wonders if she might take up the brush again after meeting a fellow painter. Will knew he was useless trying to be any kind of help to her in that regard. 

Reading his mind, she says, “Might be nice to paint again.”

He grins and connects the stars in the sky by their imaginary lines to assemble his favorite constellations. Abigail could definitely paint this scene. He hopes she will.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chicken Marbella  
> http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/chicken_marbella/
> 
> Baby Bok Choy w/ Cashews  
> http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/baby_bok_choy_with_cashews/
> 
> Verite Le Desir 2008  
> http://www.wine.com/v6/Verite-Le-Desir-2008/wine/120315/detail.aspx
> 
> Chardonnay  
> http://www.discoveryellowtail.com/wine/chardonnay.php
> 
> Melon Sorbet  
> http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/melon_sorbet/
> 
> Mischa’s shirt, in case you couldn’t picture it  
> http://www.lyst.com/clothing/rachel-zoe-ivory-geri-sleeveless-blouse/
> 
> Berniklitė = goose (diminutive), numylėtinite = darling (diminutive), mano mylimas sesuo = my beloved sister (not diminutive)


	8. Wanna Hold You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dessert and a little bit more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _I wanna hold you/I gotta hold you/Hold you baby close to me, yeah/This time it's not for fun/That you're the only one_

They have sorbet outside and only begin to get cold about three quarters into their servings. It seems almost deliberate how the sweet ice on his tongue pairs with the chill creeping down the bridge of his nose and across his cheeks. He takes a few moments to enjoy it, to enjoy the decadence of the evening and the ease of its guests’ interactions. Mischa tugs on Abigail’s arm somewhere near her last bite and leads her out onto the grass where she can point more liberally at the speckled map of stars overhead. She points at the moon for emphasis and says something that earns a belly laugh from Abigail and causes Will’s heart to clench in his chest.

Hannibal sidles up next to him where he’s leaning his elbows on the deck. He sets his dish next to Will’s on the flat polished railing and sighs softly.

“It has been a wonderful night.”

“Would have been the ideal meet cute,” Will agrees halfheartedly. Hannibal glances at him, amused.

“I quite like the way we met.” He leans over and presses a soft kiss to the apple of Will’s cheek, and he doesn’t feel cold anymore. Hannibal, he knows from experience, is a furnace at the best of times. Flirtatiously, he adds, “I was under the impression you enjoyed it as well.”

Will’s spoon scrapes against the side of his dish. He levels an embarrassed, chiding glare somewhere in the vicinity of Hannibal’s profile before trying again for the last bit of melon sorbet beginning to melt along the perfect white porcelain.

“Everything about going home with you was and continues to be incredible. I wasn’t trying to take away from that.” A burst of warmth shoots up his neck for an entirely different reason than Hannibal’s proximity alone can explain. “I just meant that this…” He trails off, trying to find his words and trying to find the reason this beautiful scene feels so undeserved and so flickering. He had only just begun to recover after all that life had thrown at him, and now, a carnal leap of faith had brought him and all of his trouble into this man’s life—he has no idea how permanently. “I can’t make sense of how we got here.”

“You know how we got here,” Hannibal murmurs in that sage fashion that doesn’t appear to be forced or even conscious. He studies Will, really picks him apart with his eyes in a gentle, caressing kind of way so that Will doesn’t register the gesture as invasive even as he catalogues that it very well might be. “Do you question a flower’s ability to grow through concrete and survive in an environment where most would deem it an aberration?”

Will drops his eyes to his empty dish and fiddles with the little silver spoon. A half-smile finds its way to his face.

“Are you comparing our relationship to a flower?” A blip of something warm and fluttery courses through Will’s belly at Hannibal’s soft smile when he calls what they have a relationship. He bites his lip. “That which we call a _rose_ by any other name would smell as sweet.”

“I take thee at thy word,” Hannibal muses expertly. “Call me but love.”

Will falters, not afraid of the word that bears so much weight because he doesn’t think Hannibal actually can mean it so soon. He looks out at the yard to find Abigail just disappearing into Hannibal’s oak tree. An endeared chuckle escapes from his lips. Hannibal’s sister has disappeared, too, so he safely assumes she must also be in the tree. Perhaps she’d suggested it so they could get a better look at whatever it was they were seeing in the stars tonight. He flicks his gaze up at the dark blue sky murky with brilliant pulsing stars.

Hannibal’s arm slides across his back, his hand dropping to hold onto his hip. He pulls him in closer so their sides slot together along all the uneven ridges and curves of their ribs and their elbows and their clothes. Their body heat seeps together immediately, comfortably. Will’s eyes drift closed, strangely sated. Hannibal’s chest buzzes slightly against Will’s shoulder when he speaks, gently.

“Does this not feel like enough?”

Will leans back into Hannibal’s touch and breathes. “It feels insane.”

“Why?”

In an effort to ground himself more in the physicality of this evening that they have been granted the opportunity to share in together, Will winds his arm around Hannibal’s back and reciprocates the embrace. He drops his head onto Hannibal’s shoulder and shifts a while to rest his chin there instead.

“Everything happened so fast.”

Hannibal stiffens just enough at Will’s side for him to feel it. Will holds him tighter so won’t get the wrong impression and try to back away. He tracks the bobbing of Hannibal’s Adam’s apple as he swallows once.

“Life sometimes requires that we act quickly.”

Will looks out at the tree and can make out Abigail’s shape. He can see Mischa’s silhouette on a higher branch.

“I know. I know it does,” Will breathes. He wishes he had come to learn that particular lesson a different way, but there is nothing for it, really. Tragedy can’t be undone. History can’t be unmade. People can’t be brought back from the dead. It’s a point of dissonance for him that he can’t ever make up his mind about whether he would have it any other way. He doesn’t think he would, and that thought, perhaps, makes him a monster. He closes his eyes and hides his face in Hannibal’s shoulder. Muffled against Hannibal’s shirt, he confesses it. He says, “I wouldn’t change any of it.”

“No, nor would I.”

Hannibal turns him slightly so they face each other and Will’s back presses into the railing. He spares a moment’s thought for the sorbet dishes and finds Hannibal setting them down a safer distance away from Will’s elbow. Will looks at him as his attention separates from him for those four or five seconds and stares helplessly and at a loss.

“I don’t deserve it.”

“Yes, you do.” Hannibal is watching him again, and there’s no doubt anywhere in his open, surprised expression or in the tight, almost angry set of his jaw. “You deserve what you want, Will.”

Something drops from just behind his sternum, heavy and stuttering and _soft_ as the tendrils of its aftershocks trace all along the backs of his ribs. It touches his windpipe and staggers the intake of breath; it fans out into a dull but persistent fire in his veins; it tingles in the tips of his fingers. It occurs to him that he already admitted to himself in Hannibal’s studio that yes, there were worse ways to fall in love.

But he must be contrary because otherwise he must accept this moment for the stark, unfair realization that it is.

He says, “You can’t have what you want just because you want it.”

Unruffled, and even smiling, Hannibal calls his bluff: “You can have me.” He kisses Will, pushing just enough against Will’s lips to assert that his claim is the truth and will not be tolerated as anything but. Their tongues touch once, and Hannibal slips his hand reverently into Will’s hair. “I want you, and you can have me.”

It happens, often, that Will misspeaks, and he has no reason to believe this encounter should be any different.

He blurts out, pathetically, “Thank you.”

An entertained smile stretches across his beautiful, kissed mouth even as Will would like nothing more than to roll his eyes at himself. Very faintly, he can sense an unwelcome disappointment behind that calm, accepting exterior. Hannibal does exceedingly well to conceal that he feels it at all, but Will is of a sensitive enough temperament and disposition that he doesn’t need to see it for him to know that it’s there, rippling unpleasantly beneath the surface.

Hannibal pulls away from him, and Will’s heart sinks, thinking that he failed in this test of both trust and intimacy but regains hope when he hears the soft approach of footfalls. He turns and sees Abigail leading the way. She has a wide smile on her face that he hopes is residual from climbing a tree and stargazing but is probably a result of spying Will with his arms around Hannibal in such a close, delicate exchange. She is every bit as perceptive as he is, if not much more in certain situations where people are involved. He notices motivations; she notices the more unconscious things. Hannibal and his sister share in sensitivity to something in between the two.

He wishes he could articulate that revelation to Hannibal; wishes he could put it into so many words and say, _Yes, we’re a perfect fit. I_ see _it. I_ know. _I’m just afraid because it makes too much sense and it can’t stay this perfect; there’s just no way we can stay this golden._

Mischa plods loudly up the steps of the dock, graceful in the intensity and vitality of her movements. She teases at two of them over Abigail’s shoulder, “About ready to head back inside, lovebirds?”

Abigail ducks her head when Will looks at her, desperate, probably, for some help that she only responds to with a grin and a shake of her head.

It would be too much on its own for Will to be having this much fun, but Abigail, clearly, loves it. She loves to interact with the younger Lecter sibling, and she loves to laugh at Will in the most encouraging, affectionate way. She loves to see him standing with Hannibal and holding him and looking so stupidly _in love_ with a near stranger that has evidently become so much more than the title could ever suggest. She loves that their lives could become this lighthearted, domestic festival of stars, melon sorbet, and durable, shivering tree branches.

The look on her face changes by a hair, by a hundredth of a centimeter, and he catches himself projecting a blurry thrumming panic. He weakly excuses himself and staggers—he hopes to high heaven that it doesn’t look like staggering, but he’s pretty sure it’s what he does—into the house.

It takes a confused moment, but Abigail follows him inside and quietly pulls the backdoor shut behind her. She leans her back against it and waits for him to begin, eyes on the floor so as not to pressure him into speaking before he’s ready.

“I shouldn’t have brought you here.” He waits, but she doesn’t answer him. She doesn’t say the words on the tip of her tongue; doesn’t say that she likes it here, that she likes Mischa and Hannibal, too. She just gives him time upon time, and the seconds tick sluggishly away. He scrubs a hand down his face and then back up, unsettling the stubble peppering his cheek. “If this whole thing goes south, if it doesn’t mean anything, if it’s just another horrible thing that happens to us—what do I do, Abigail?” She gives him her eyes finally and frowns at the obvious turmoil set so deeply within him. He laughs miserably. “I can’t handle…” His breath hitches. “If I fail, and this becomes another thing you have to lose because of me—”

“No.” Her arms close around his shoulders, fingers digging firmly into his back. “No. Stop it.”

He can feel that he’s shaking, and he hates it. He holds on, trying to make himself stop the way Abigail tells him to. She hushes him even though he’s so much taller than she is, even though he can’t fathom a world where it makes sense for her to comfort him in this way, though it has been happening with an increased frequency since Will began venturing out of the house in his pursuit of some kind of improved life for himself and Abigail.

Here he had just made his fear of possible commitment—of possible loss—about her. He’d done it once already with Lounds’ blog, made it about her pain, her shame. He resolves to break the habit before it solidifies.

“God.” He starts to pull away, disgusted with himself for his weakness and for making her a part of it when that was the absolute last thing he had ever wanted to do. She lets him inch back out of the embrace, but she doesn’t relinquish her hold on his arms. “Oh, God, I’m sorry. Don’t listen to me.”

“You haven’t dealt with what happened, with what you had to,” she says, voice merciful and gentle in Hannibal’s vast kitchen. “You need to get passed it.”

“Have you?”

“I leave a little bit more of it behind every day.” Her eyes shine, but her jaw is steady and relaxed. “I try to look ahead. You’ve helped.” Her voice breaks on the last word, and Will is the one to pull her in closer now. She doesn’t cry, but she accepts his gesture automatically with a natural trust and belief in his intentions. They stay like that, comfortable and bound and exorcised of a temporary, superficial grief. She asks him, delicately as if he might run or burst apart at the seams, “Do you want to go home?”

“No.” He shakes his head. “I’ve been so awful all night. It wouldn’t be right to leave after that rude exit I just made.”

“You were afraid,” Abigail remarks. “Better you feel that than feeling nothing at all.”

“Right, it’s a compliment that I ran away from a prospective mate with my tail between my legs.”

Firmly but with impossible kindness, she says, “You weren’t running from any of us, Will.”

She steps away and breaks the comfortable circle she’d created around him with her arms. She goes for the door with a question in her expression. He nods once and leans back against the counter where he’d stood to kiss Hannibal as he washed dishes. He hopes he looks casual because he feels wrecked inside.

Abigail walks in first with Mischa right behind her. She migrates immediately to Will’s side, knowing instinctively that he seeks some indirect form of protection from whatever scrutiny the slight scene he just made will merit him. Mischa lingers a moment to hold the door for her brother to follow in with the four emptied sorbet dishes neatly stacked together. It isn’t awkward from the start. Mischa closes the door and latches the lock, suggesting airily that she show Abigail Hannibal’s impressive library. She touches Will’s arm once for support and then concedes to leave him with Hannibal for whatever talk they must have now that the cracks in Will’s armor have shown through so brashly.

The women leave, easy and open with each other that Will can feel, now that it has been sucked out of the room, he had equally, effortlessly shared with Hannibal. He stays where is stiffly propped up against the counter while Hannibal silently washes, dries, and shelves the dishes and the spoons. He dries his hands, and Will waits, anxiously quaking on a subatomic level just beneath his skin and deep within his blood. He swallows and sighs silently as Hannibal folds the towel and tosses it onto the counter before stepping around Will and pressing his fingers under the ridge of his jaw so his face comes up at an angle to Hannibal’s. Their lips seal together in a kiss that shouldn’t solve anything but so entirely, so faultlessly does in this one extenuating circumstance.

It tells him Hannibal won’t hold his indiscretion over his head; it tells him Hannibal isn’t afraid even if Will is terrified; it tells him it’s still okay to kiss and touch Hannibal if he wants to.

And he does want. He _wants._

“Of course I want you,” Will breathes stormily against Hannibal’s chin. “Of course I do.” Desperate for his point to get across, he mumbles against Hannibal’s skin as he worshipfully kisses his neck, “Of course, of course.”

“Why are you so afraid I would abandon this, Will? Why do you think I could give this up when it is so beautiful and so rare? Why do you think you could be so easily discarded?”

Will hums what he hopes will be received as a negation. He sighs against Hannibal’s throat and tucks himself into the convenient Will-Graham-shaped crook of Hannibal’s shoulder. Hannibal buries his nose in Will’s hair just above his ear and breathes warm and alive and _sure._

“It was hell, what we went through. I…” His lip brushes against Hannibal’s skin when he takes it between his teeth and decides it would be put to better use in between words casually shaped against Hannibal’s slow and steady pulse. He presses his forehead against the underside of Hannibal’s jaw, all of his words gone.

Hannibal makes a thoughtful noise in the back of his throat. He scratches his nails lightly against Will’s back through his shirt. He thinks, mournfully, that if his shirt were not tucked in Hannibal would slide his hand beneath the material and reevaluate the lines and textures of Will’s skin.

He can feel the rift in Hannibal’s resolve just before he says, “Yes, I understand.”

There won’t be an explanation tonight. Will nods to signify that he doesn’t expect one, and Hannibal, quietly reading his body language, sighs in relief.

“Our girls will be wondering about us,” he says, voice lilting in a playful tease. It sounds so serene and lush the way Hannibal says it, as if the four of them could be a family together, as if they have just acknowledged so much more between them than just the fact of their mutual infatuation and the heavy burdens of their pain. Will smiles against Hannibal’s cheek and kisses him because he can and because he doesn’t care to waste another moment of this night they have together being afraid of himself or of how he might lose this beautiful thing they have.

“We shouldn’t keep them waiting then,” Will murmurs, interjecting kisses in between his words. Hannibal hums against his lips and bends down to nip at his chin.

“Ever the considerate host,” Hannibal muses. He leans back slightly so Will isn’t quite pressed up against the counter but still wrapped up in Hannibal all the same. “Rather fortunate as you have me breaking all of my etiquette rules.”

“You’re going to have to explain that to me in a lot more detail when we have a minute,” Will murmurs, smiling and lightheaded and fuzzy. Hannibal smiles at him, and his heart soars, and he doesn’t ever want to go home.

Hannibal walks with him through the kitchen to the foyer and down the hall to the library where Mischa and Abigail, _their girls_ , are sitting side by side on the bench before Hannibal’s harpsichord. Will knows from many late nights and earlier mornings that Abigail plays a little piano, though it isn’t her strongest instrument. Mischa appears to know less about it and pounds inelegantly on a chord Abigail shows her to make. From the sound of it, Hannibal has had it restrung. The notes sound exquisitely pure.

He shoots Hannibal a pleased glance, receiving an indulgent smirk in response. They walk into the room together, and Abigail turns to greet them first, drawing her eyes to them urgently at first with worry and then softening her expression when she sees them standing together, shoulders relaxed and hands, Will looks down, loosely tied together. Mischa notices their appearance in the next moment before Will can react to Abigail’s relieved smile.

“This one says you can play this atrocious thing.” She botches a block chord somewhere near the middle C. “Is it true? Someone other than my darling brother can play his beloved harpsichord?”

Hannibal nudges his side encouragingly with his elbow, arm already brushing his from wrist to mid-forearm. Will looks at him momentarily. It _had_ sounded a bit like a challenge, he supposes.

Will smiles and steps away from Hannibal, accepting. He quips, “Any requests?”

“Play an aria from the Goldberg Variations,” Abigail says looking straight up at him as he takes Mischa’s side of the bench as she stands. She goes to scoot farther down the bench, but he waves his hand for her to be still.

He chooses one of the shorter ones and one of Abigail’s known favorites and plays, focused and assured in his hands and fingers not to betray him. Their shoulders brush familiarly as he sweeps up and down the keys. He’d played this way for her a few times in the past, usually gone two in the morning if he heard her clattering restlessly in the kitchen for coffee, tea, hot chocolate, or anything she could find to occupy her mind in the absence of sleep.

It’s easy and calm, her presence at his side. Her arm is solid and warm against his. He sways slightly as he plays, coaxed in and soothed by the pleasant metallic twinge to the notes. Will loves his piano, but the harpsichord possesses a unique sound he can’t naturally replicate otherwise.

Abigail huffs a delighted laughs when he takes his hands away from the keys in a flourish after finishing the short arrangement. He looks over his shoulder to see the siblings standing a ways off, Hannibal’s elbow linked with Mischa’s as she leans into his side fondly. She is a full head shorter than him, so she rests her head against the side of his bicep rather than resting her chin where Will had on his shoulder. Hannibal looks up from his sister’s face with blurry warmth in his expression that frightens, overloads, charms, wins, and captivates Will entirely. Mischa opens her eyes and smiles, pleased and vivid and awake and _here._

It’s Hannibal’s emotion, and it doesn’t feel wrong to feel it so fully or to enjoy it so much. It feels damn beautiful.

“You must come and play for me while Hannibal is away,” she suggests genuinely, unassumingly. “It can be so lonesome when he leaves.”

“You wanted us to agree to the European tour,” he reminds her lightly. He slips his arm out of her grasp and around her back the way he had held Will, which makes the action seem that much more intimate than Will had dared to imagine it could be in the moment. “It could have come at a better time,” he concedes.

She doesn’t respond but instead twists in his hold and glances at the watch on his left wrist where it rests against her waist. Will looks at his own and tries not to frown at the tiny clock face that reads nearly eleven o’ clock. If they don’t leave soon they won’t get home until nearly midnight. It’s not as if either of them had anything to do early the following morning, but Will doesn’t want to keep Abigail out much later than absolutely necessary. She has a hard enough time finding sleep as it is.

He does reason, for a moment, that a long, late car ride might just do the trick as far as getting her to fall asleep tonight goes.

“Maybe we should head out.” He glances at Abigail. She looks energized for the most part, but they do have the hour-long drive ahead of them. He feels a bit like he’s been through the wringer himself. Undoubtedly he looks exactly the way he feels, though Mischa is still giving him that look like her brother hasn’t brought anyone of quality home in such a long time that Will is a treasure and a comforting sight for sore eyes.

In fact, he can almost hear her begging Hannibal to keep him. Instead of flaring up into some pathetic rage over the idea of being kept, he goes a little smug on the inside. He muses to himself, happy and satisfied, _you can keep me._

_You can have me._

Mischa surprises him once more with her remorseless honesty. She pairs it this time with an impressive display of puppy dog eyes that has Will madly curious about whether Hannibal can make that face, too. “Must you really go?”

Identifying _the look_ immediately, Hannibal chides her, “Mischa.”

Will hears from beside him, “ _Do_ we?” He turns, shocked, to see Abigail watching him innocently. “It’s just kind of a drive back.” She shrugs.

“I—We…”

He’ll have sex with Hannibal if they stay.

“Will?” He looks up into Hannibal’s—goddamn it—hopeful face when he says his name and swallows hard.

He very much would like to have sex with Hannibal again before he leaves in the morning. There is no question in his mind that they would and happily if he decides to stay, but Abigail is here. His brain argues with his body about what he should do as a responsible role model and what he should do as a man whose boyfriend is about to be away for four horrid months.

Ever the considerate host, ever the _martyr_ , he tries, “We really shouldn’t impose.”

“Dad—” Will’s heart skips a beat. Abigail’s face blanches. She furrows her eyebrows together, blinks twice, and shakes her head slightly as if to clear the misplaced through from her mind. Quietly, she says, “I’m tired.”

“Stay the night,” Mischa coos sympathetically, eyes soft and nonjudgmental when Will looks up at her. “There are plenty of spare rooms in this big house of his.”

Will is too discombobulated to come up with another refusal, so he just nods numbly. Abigail nudges his arm.

“Get some sleep tonight.” She glances up and so does Will. The siblings are talking by the door, each distracted enough with their conversation that they don’t pay any attention to Will and Abigail’s aside on the bench. She redirects her attention back to Will and says, “Or you know, don’t.”

She winks, and though it is decidedly playful and well-intended, he can see that she does look exhausted now. Will opens his mouth to protest, but no sounds come out. Abigail just smiles, eyes shining and wrinkled at the corners.

He doesn’t have words for her, so he just winds his arm behind her back and pulls her into his side. She goes because she’s tired and he’s warm, but this tenderness for tenderness’ sake is something new that has been gifted to him in more recent months. He presses his hand to her hair and then drops it to his side, opting not to leave a kiss there on the top of her head. She stands when Mischa comes to collect her. Abigail says a polite goodnight to Hannibal and shakes his hand, thanking him briefly for letting them stay the night.

“Of course, Abigail. I am very happy to have met you.”

“You, too,” she says ducking her head. “Play well in Germany.”

“Goodnight, Will.”

He stands to shake Mischa’s hand, but she pulls him into a firm hug instead. He laughs and returns it about halfway before she steps away from him. She gives her brother a kiss on the cheek and leads Abigail out the room into the hall.

Will watches them go. Their footsteps retreat up the stairs and leave him alone with Hannibal again. He closes the distance between them and laces his fingers through Hannibal’s, fearless in the action now that Hannibal has already initiated it once tonight.

“Are you tired, Will?”

He swallows. A door closes upstairs.

“Not especially.” He drops his eyes to Hannibal’s mouth and laughs shakily. “I mean, I am, but…and you have to get up early tomorrow, so.”

A slow, wide smile spreads across Hannibal’s face. He laughs, actually laughs, at Will and leans forward to kiss him. There’s no urgency to it, but a slow lick of desire uncurls in Will’s belly all the same. He sighs and licks into Hannibal’s mouth, trying to share that delicious build in any way that he can. Hannibal reacts in kind and slips a hand into Will’s hair.

“We should go to my room,” Hannibal sighs, untucking Will’s shirt and nibbling on his ear.

“Jesus, then you need to quit that.” Will chokes on a moan bubbling up in the back of his throat. “We have to be quiet. It’s not as if they don’t already know what we’re doing, and that’s embarrassing enough.”

“Why does it embarrass you?” Hannibal asks him breathlessly, ducking down to unbutton Will’s shirt once and tugs the collar aside to suck a mark into Will’s skin.

“Oh, my—Hannibal, just wait a…” He pinches his eyes shut and bunches his fingers into a fist against Hannibal’s scalp. “Christ, if you don’t stop, I’m shoving you onto the couch and taking what I want,” Will threatens, voice gruff with desire, impatience, and a heady fear of being discovered by either Mischa or Abigail.

Hannibal’s smile flickers into a smirk, and for a moment, Will considers running for the stairs or for the library doors at the very least.

“Lead the way, Will.”

He doesn’t dally. He calmly vacates the library and climbs the stairs with an athletic agility as Hannibal daintily closes the library doors and follows Will up to his room. The hallway is empty. The doors to every room have been pulled shut, but Will remembers which one is Hannibal’s and confidently lets himself in. He kicks off his socks and shoes and has undone two buttons when Hannibal joins him and closes the door. The room is illuminated only by moonlight at first. Hannibal flips the switch for his bedside lamp.

“Let me do that, please,” he whispers, taking care of Will’s shirt and belt before Will realizes he can undress Hannibal, too, while he’s at it. He tackles Hannibal’s buttons, working quickly but brushing knuckles and fingers and palms all up and down Hannibal’s skin as it becomes available to him. He presses his lips to Hannibal’s chest and pushes the shirt off his shoulders, hands dropping to work at his belt as his tongue grazes over a patch of chest hair.

Hannibal pushes him down onto the bed and strips off Will’s slacks before crawling on top of him and pressing down. Will makes a noise, too loud of a noise, when Hannibal pins his wrists above his head. He lets Hannibal silence him with searing kisses, their collective groans muffled by the wet connection between their mouths. Will accidentally bites the tongue sliding slick and hot against his and wraps his legs around Hannibal’s waist, shivering at the growl that buzzes against his throat when Hannibal bends down to kiss him there.

“Tell me what you want, Will. I’ll give you whatever you want.”

“You, above me like this,” he pants, testing the grip around his wrists. Hannibal starts to let him go when he feels Will tugging to get away, and he doesn’t like the way that feels. He licks his lips and tries to coherency as he revises his previous statement: “I want you to hold me down.”

“With my hands, Will?”

“You have something else?”

He sits up, and before Will can protest the loss, he pulls him to sit up, too.

“I could bind them, if you would like.” Hannibal swallows thickly and surges forward to kiss Will’s jaw and gently roll his earlobe between his teeth. His breath is a hot and constant tickle down the side of his neck. “Would you enjoy that?”

Will bites his lip, more curious about what it would do to Hannibal if he said yes than he is concerned for himself. It’s probably the trust element that has him salivating and moaning against Will’s shoulder like an animal. Will’s eyes fall closed, and he says yes because he thinks he would enjoy it and because he won’t be lucid enough when Hannibal comes home in _four months_ to relinquish the ability to touch Hannibal back as he fucks him into the mattress.

“Yes, do it.”

Hannibal jumps off the bed and makes for the walk-in closet. He disappears behind the door, and Will waits, vibrating, until Hannibal returns with a folded length of rope.

“Jesus Christ,” he breathes, loud enough for Hannibal to hear him. He pauses for a moment to assess the tool in his hands before approaching the bed again.

“It looks much more severe than it is,” he explains, sounding much more composed than he did just twenty seconds ago. Will’s thankful. He doesn’t know if he would let Hannibal tie him up if he couldn’t construct intelligible sentences. He still has to swallow before he says the next words, which makes Will’s blood sing, but his wits haven’t abandoned him just yet. He is experienced enough in this kind of play to know Will can’t have him mumbling intoxicated gibberish if he’s to be persuaded that this is a good idea. “I would never tie an inescapable knot, and I would only tie your hands, for now.”

Will’s heart hammers in his chest.

“What do I do?”

“To release the knot, you would tell me a word, and I would loosen it so you could pull free.”

“A safe word,” Will remarks, astonished. He’s pleased to say he isn’t boring in bed, but he’s never been tied up before, and he’s sure as hell never needed a safe word. “You mean I tell you my safe word.”

“If you had rather not try this tonight, Will, I would be content to put it back.”

“I want to see what it does to you.” A heavy, nearly silent sigh gusts passed his lips, swollen and red with a waxy look to them. Will leans in and kisses him just to hear Hannibal’s breath catch and devolve into broken moans and animalistic grunts. “You said you’d give me whatever I want; that’s what I want.” He licks slowly and deliberately from the curve of Hannibal’s jaw to just behind his ear. He drops the rope beside Will on the bed and forces him down against the pillows, grabbing at the last of Will’s clothes and kicking off what remains clinging to his own body.

Will looks down at all that beautiful, humming skin that is just for him tonight and hopefully for many more nights to come. He takes the abuse Hannibal wreaks on his lips and tongue and lies back, pliant and anxious and eager. He feels before he sees the neat loop of smooth rope sliding around his wrists in practiced, methodical circles. He frantically gulps down long pulls of oxygen and sighs when Hannibal moves to leave carefully placed kisses on the tops of Will’s cheekbones, along his closed eyelids, and over the arches of his eyebrows. He tugs on the knot when Hannibal asks him to and watches as the entire complex helix of fiber and intricate knots unravels.

He marvels at the deflated snake of rope on his stomach and watches Hannibal procure a barbell from the bedside drawer. Hannibal also picks out a condom and a shiny, sleek bottle. He takes up the rope again, and Will notes his fully nude body, bare chest and all on display. Hannibal smiles at him, aware of his realization and only slightly wary of what Will might think of it. Will just smiles shyly back to reassure him that this is okay. It really is, he is surprised to find.

It really, truly is okay.

Hannibal studiously begins to tie the complicated knot again and calmly asks Will what he would like for his safe word to be. Will lies back and watches Hannibal work over his hands, taking as much care to be gentle as he does to be efficient. Hannibal vigorously tests every knot as he goes, deliberate in his actions and looking a lot like an ER surgeon in the process. His shoulders hunch forward just that little bit to give him the impression of an artist or writer fighting sleep and slouch to capture the final wisps of an idea barely seen from the suggestion of a half-remembered dream.

He looks up at Will, the barbell prepared hold the knot steady but waiting on Will’s safe word. Will smiles and thinks of all the books in Hannibal’s library, thinks of a fireplace, and a darkened club and good music.

He says, “Saxophone.”

Hannibal grins and kisses him, nudging the barbell into place. A mere slide is all it takes, and when Will tugs at the knot the way he had before, the rope doesn’t budge. Heat floods through his chest and down passed his belly. Hannibal touches his hips and squeezes before letting him go.

He presses his forehead against Will’s collar bone, voice so nearly wrecked through with a guttural moan when he manages to speak again for Will’s benefit. He clarifies, “Say that word, and this will come free.”

Will nods breathless and writhing and tugging just to feel friction. Hannibal reaches beside him for the rest of the things he took from the bedside drawer, and Will closes his eyes. Hannibal’s name becomes a whisper and a prayer on his lips. He says it again and again, lost already to his bonds. If the agonized, garbled groan is anything to go by, it’s quite clear he takes Hannibal much the same way with him. It’s perfect that they would be lost together. It’s perfect, and he doesn’t want anything else.

He _wants_ , and the severity and the promise it carries with it is more than enough for now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Romeo and Juliet_ written by the illustrious Billy Shakes.
> 
> Goldberg Variations BWV 988: Aria – Da Capo


	9. Love Is Strong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys say their fond farewells.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _You make me hard you make me weak/I wait for you until the dawn/My mind is ripped my heart is torn/And love is strong and you’re so sweet/Your love is bitter it's taken neat_

Will is mostly not present when Hannibal tends to the menial task of stretching him open. The greater part of his attention is allocated toward his wrists and how the rope feels smooth in one sense but rough in another; strangely delicate but durable like worn leather and of a wholly different consistency. He shifts his wrists rhythmically in their bonds to match the slow undulations of his hips pressing down and then easing back. Hannibal is overly generous with the lubrication this time around, probably to assure Will that he won’t hurt him in his vulnerability.

He looks down the lengths of their bodies and catalogues every supple protrusion of muscle pressing up beneath flesh, every image made permanent in ink, and every healed, puckered scar. Hannibal has his long-ago broken arm, and Will has his gunshot wound. The eyes of Argus stare down at Will’s body objectively, secured in the peacock’s tail feathers fanned out across Hannibal’s chest.

Will watches the colors and the lines fencing them in, completely unsuspecting of the jolt that begins somewhere in the back of his pelvis and shoots into a hundred directions. His back arches from the bottom of his shoulder blades to his tailbone. The crown of his head digs into the mattress, and a low, surprised noise buzzes in his throat.

Hannibal is smiling and trying to pass it off for smirking when Will manages to refocus his eyes. He blinks a few times at Hannibal, shocked and still shivering from the abrupt assault on his nerves. Hannibal full-on grins and nudges his fingers the same way they had gone to make his body lift off the bed. Will’s eyelids fall blissfully closed, a softer, demure sound falling freely from his barely parted lips. He stretches his hands up higher over his head for the headboard, fingers balling up easily into fists as his knuckles brush the smooth, chilled wood. When it becomes apparent to him that he has enough leverage to push off of it, he does so with abandon.

Hannibal’s hands go still at the gesture but not out of annoyance. Will watches Hannibal’s face as he commandeers the privilege of his pleasure and observes, with great pride and satisfaction, that his inability to play the role of the totally passive partner has pleased him. He finds Hannibal biting his lip into the same color as a beautiful, ruddy nectarine with his eyes dark and at half-mast.

It takes self-control, but Will does manage to make himself slow down to a stop. Hannibal’s hands are warm on him and inside him, one splayed low across his belly and the other pulling gently out of his body. Will sighs and nuzzles his bicep to get the hair out of his eyes. Hannibal takes over for him with the cleaner of his two hands and twists the other in his discarded shirt a few times to rid it of excess lubrication. He sits up on his knees and studies Will, a hungry expression on his face and something wild stirring up inside him beneath the calm surface.

Deciding, he ties the end of the rope around Will’s hands to the wooden rail atop the headboard. He checks for Will’s disagreement and finding none, loops the rope into a simple, sturdy knot. Will licks his lips and lays his head back, a frenzied, fluttering feeling kicking up in his stomach, too.

He shifts his hips a little when he feels Hannibal tugging at his legs. Hannibal moves him just enough to pull him out of reach of the headboard and places a pillow from the other side of the bed beneath Will’s hips before resituating his legs around his waist. Will marvels, internally, at how none of this encounter shocks him in the slightest.

Hannibal slides right in once he’s content with the arrangement of Will’s limbs tangled around him or otherwise tangled in rope. It’s an easy stretch to accommodate. Will is already far gone enough from the repeated stimulation of his prostate that his body is much farther ahead of Hannibal’s from that first slow, sinuous press of skin into and against skin.

“ _Oh,_ ” Will breathes, shoulders and neck deflating of tension, though his arms and wrists still strain to hold him.

“Relax.”

Hannibal’s voice is all leisure and warm suggestions. Will flexes his wrists and closes his eyes, trying.

He whispers into Will’s cheek, “Let me.”

His lips find the pulse in Will’s neck and mold around the hot, sticky skin there. A ridiculous noise like a mewl bubbles up in his throat and drops freely from his lips as Hannibal bites down, first softly and then harder.

“Yes,” Hannibal sighs once his teeth detach from the sweltering flesh.

Will tugs feebly at his hands before letting go. His shoulders start to tingle, and Hannibal inches him back toward the headboard before he can voice his complaint. The sensation quiets down and makes way for newer, more visceral ones to light through him. Will bites his arm when Hannibal deprives him of his kiss as a means of shutting himself up. Hannibal obviously finds it endearing, even if Will can’t gather his senses enough to develop a fully formed opinion about it. He squeezes his eyes shut and keeps his lips pressed tightly together, but the frantic half-moans find their way to the surface anyway.

It really can’t be helped. Hannibal bites his lips and encourages every wordless, desperate plea. He plants a hand beside Will’s head and clutches the sheets as he moves. His other hands clings to Will’s hip before sliding up to grasp the side of his thigh and hold it closer around his waist. Will surges up and muffles his urgent keening against Hannibal’s throat. He shakes with the effort of holding himself up before Hannibal steadies him with a hand braced in between his shoulders.

“Wait, wait, wait.” Will nips clumsily at Hannibal’s shoulder. He gnashes his teeth harder than he means to, but Hannibal doesn’t appear bothered by it. He pauses in his movements, confused and probably waiting for Will to implement his safe word.

But Will intends to do nothing of the sort.

“Turn me over,” he demands more than requests in a weak voice.

Hannibal’s lips quirk on one side, and he eases out of him. His voice is hoarse when he says, “Hold onto the headboard.”

Will does as he is instructed and hangs on, repositioning his hands as Hannibal rotates the lower half of his body. The pillow is yanked out from beneath him as he twists his torso the rest of the way and sinks comfortably into the blankets. His fingers grip the rail where the rope has been tied, but he doesn’t strain to support himself this time, trusting that Hannibal will keep him from toppling one way or the other.

He gasps audibly when Hannibal insinuates himself back inside of him, nudging slowly at first so just the head sinks inside of him and then draws back out. Will isn’t proud of it, but he actually whines the eighth or ninth time it happens. He presses his hips back more insistently, spreads his legs wider, and forces his body to swallow up more of Hannibal’s maddeningly elusive cock with the gesture.

Will hums softly into the blanket, satisfied with the added pressure. Hannibal doesn’t deny him more of it once he captures that first bit. He settles in deeper and deeper until he’s nestled in as far as his hips and Will’s ass will allow.

Hannibal spreads a warm hand down the small of Will’s back and follows the curve of his waist until his fingers can latch around his hip. They don’t try for their old tempo, but instead hold at a comfortable, rocking pace that fills up the empty spaces inside of Will with warmth starting right at the tail end of his spine. It grazes up higher to his belly, his lungs, his throat, the line of his jaw, and up to his eye sockets where his cheeks burn with the heat of it. The blankets, stiflingly hot to his skin now, catch his moans and the hitches in his breathing. He can feel Hannibal biting and sucking along the nodules of his spinal cord where his skin has gone feverishly hot.

He whispers something indistinguishable into Will’s shoulder and bites down without pinching his skin between his teeth. One of his hands comes up fast and imprecise to grab the railing beside Will’s weakly clutching ones, and an intangible switch somewhere in between their sweating, rolling bodies flips. Hannibal forces his hips forward and commands Will to follow him in his crazed, staggering movements.

Will’s grip slackens as the persistent thrumming in his body flares out hotter and heavier inside of him. He releases the railing in favor of sinking down to his elbows and shifting back onto Hannibal’s cock with his head thrown back and his mouth slack as breath drags in and out of his airway.

Hannibal presses his hand up under his bared throat, palm a light pressure against his Adam’s apple and first two fingers perched gently on the ridge of his mandible. Will bites off his groan and turns his head to accept a kiss from Hannibal’s lips. He takes several, messy and wet and noisy, before Hannibal ducks away abruptly to straighten out his back. He peels his hot, sticky chest off Will’s shoulders and modifies his angle so that Will’s back bows instantly and his arms give out from beneath him. He moans freely into the barrier of the blankets, thighs trembling and the back of his neck burning.

He is a boneless creature writhing in the thrall of his passion in the moments before his orgasm begins to build in him, a reckless, fiery impulse clawing up through him but not fueled enough yet to ignite. Hannibal slips his hand around Will’s side and weaves his fingers lazily through the sweating patch of pubic hair cruelly separating him from Will’s cock. Will swears emphatically into his arm, probably cursing Hannibal or maybe reciting the Constitution for all that he can tell, before Hannibal finally wraps his fingers around him and pumps him once.

His blood roars in his ears, but he knows he doesn’t scream because his mouth is half-full of duvet, and the telltale ripple of sound doesn’t buzz on his tongue or in his throat. Hannibal moves some behind him, claiming his orgasm in a much more collected manner than Will had but still with signs of abandon clearly written across his features when Will turns to see him over his shoulder.

Hannibal groans low in the back of his throat, eyes pinched shut the way they were the first time they were together by the fireplace. As if remembering himself at the last moment, he grits his teeth and quiets down. His eyes fall open and he stares at Will before pressing into him gently a few more times. The action draws weak, if lazy, sounds of protest from both of them.

He pulls out and gingerly rolls Will over before loosening the knot from the wooden rail on the headboard and then removing the barbell from its place in the neat braid of rope around Will’s wrists. Will makes no motion to pull the knot for himself, so Hannibal undoes it by meticulously unraveling the rope rather than by tugging it free the way he’d shown Will to do it before. He leans back and loops the rope into a loose lasso. Will watches him thoughtlessly, burnt out and exorcised of a previous weight he hadn’t fully comprehended before it was lifted from him. Hannibal tosses the rope with the barbell tucked carefully inside onto the floor.

Will shifts his gaze from Hannibal to the rope on the floor and back to Hannibal. A slow smile spreads across his face in the moments before Hannibal sighs, resigned to his compulsivity, and steps off the bed to dispose of the condom and its wrapper, tuck the barbell and the bottle of lube into the bedside drawer, and place the rope back in the closet. He comes back a moment later from the adjoining bathroom with a warm washcloth for Will’s stomach.

Fastidious as Hannibal has shown himself to be, he doesn’t seem bothered by the obvious wet patch Will has left on his bed. He figures, in part, that Hannibal probably acknowledges that it was mostly Hannibal’s fault, though it had been Will’s idea to turn onto his stomach.

He lets Hannibal tend to his mess as he examines his wrists. The rope Hannibal used to tie him up must have been made for sex rather than something more rugged and outdoorsy as it barely chafed his skin at all. He bears a few scuffs here and there and he’ll probably sport a burn of some sort in the morning for all that he pulled against it, but his skin isn’t as raw as he thought it would be. He rubs at one abused wrist dazedly with his thumb, licking his lips and letting his eyes drift closed. The orange suggestion of light behind Will’s closed eye lids melts into black as Hannibal slides into bed beside him.

Will lets himself be tugged back and away from the side of the bed he so spectacularly came on and clambers under the bed sheet beneath the soiled duvet. He goes comfortably limp against Hannibal’s bare shoulder and makes it hilariously difficult for him to roll the aforementioned duvet toward the foot of the bed in a contained bundle to be washed later. Will wonders absently how many times he’s had to perform this specific aftercare ritual in the past, but it isn’t a fair thought to have, so he stops himself from thinking it over too much.

He stretches out a bit, arm reaching out over Hannibal’s side and neck tilting one way. The movement causes his hair to brush against Hannibal’s chin. Warm, strong fingers press the nape of Will’s neck and knead at his sweat-soaked hairline. Will hums contentedly at the pressure and leans his cheek up on Hannibal’s collar bone. He moves with Hannibal as the man shifts onto his back and allows Will to lie on top of him, wrapped around one side of his body.

“Are you tired now, Will?”

Hannibal’s voice is quiet and suggestive. Its resonance carries the scratch of exhaustion and satiation. Will can’t help his smile, but Hannibal can’t see him so he doesn’t try. He doesn’t feel like he would try to hide it anyway.

“No,” Will lies.

He laughs when Hannibal prods his ribs with gentle hands, touch meant to tease and not to harm. Hannibal holds him tighter when he squirms. His arm lines up with Will’s shoulders in a pliable, comfortable snare.

“I suppose I could go for another round.”

Will pushes up on his elbows and gives Hannibal his very best put-upon expression, but they’ve had this particular exchange once already. He ends up smiling deviously at their situation, at himself, and at Hannibal for being so damn charming and good-looking. Hannibal doesn’t appear to follow his train of thought, so Will steals his moment of confusion and uses it to turn the tables.

He sits up, rolling his shoulders and arching his back as he goes, before sliding one leg over Hannibal’s side and effectively straddling him. Hannibal’s mouth drops open just a fraction. He slides his hands up to grab at Will’s hips but doesn’t do anything else, though he does swallow once, hard.

Will smirks as he says, “I’m game.”

They stare for a moment, each challenging the other, until Hannibal laughs and Will laughs with him.

“I get the feeling you aren’t used to people teasing you back,” Will murmurs.

He spreads his fingers across Hannibal’s stomach and traces a few fingers up the sloping curves tattooed along Hannibal’s ribs beneath his left arm. His fingers track higher up to the source of the sweeping, unconnected lines. Hannibal accommodates him by lifting his arm a fraction and revealing a cluster of black strokes in the middle that comprises a deer’s head.

Hannibal watches Will’s fingers follow the line of the animal’s jaw up to one antler and then up the full length of one of the tines.

He says, “You certainly aren’t like anyone else I’ve ventured to bring home.”

“No, I’m not,” Will answers flatly.

He’s not like anyone. He grew up with that much drilled irreparably into his head.

Will doesn’t want to linger on reasons or explanations or exceptions. He swallows down the apologetic comments he doesn’t have to make and chooses a different topic to explore, a safer one.

“Your sister seems to think you bring home exclusively unattractive men,” Will leads, smiling as he does. Hannibal isn’t surprised to hear Mischa’s assessment. He’s probably heard it before. “So I know already I’m different in that respect.”

“She _would_ have called them unattractive.” Hannibal only barely refrains from rolling his eyes. “What she really means is one-dimensional. Most people are horribly plain, given her standards.”

Hannibal lays his head back and stares up at the ceiling in contemplation. A lone wrinkle works its way in between his eyebrows. He looks back up at Will, a funny little quirk twisting the very edge of it. Will leans down and kisses that lifted corner, one hand splayed along the spindly stag’s heart and the other across the throat of the peacock. Before he can sit back up he feels Hannibal’s fingers in his hair. They remain locked together that way, aligned and slotted together where their bodies allow. 

“Most are plain by my standards as well.”

Will’s bare thigh feels warm against Hannibal’s hip. He shifts slightly beneath him and pulls him to lie back down with his one hand behind Will’s head and the other on the small of his back.

Hannibal is giving him a frightening look now, one that doesn’t penetrate but that manages to touch a very deep place inside of him all the same. Will remembers Mischa said something about Hannibal consuming the people he dated before him. She said he needed someone he couldn’t devour as easily.

He doesn’t have anything profound to say, so he settles on his usual: “I still think this is crazy.”

And with the innocence of a small child asking for an explanation of the blue of the sky, Hannibal asks him, “Why?”

He thinks to ask how many times Hannibal has done this, danced to this particular tune of being in bed with a near stranger and claiming all sorts of wild, unfathomable things. He would ask if he could get his lungs to pull on enough oxygen, if he could form his lips around the words, if he could find the words at all. But it occurs to him, with a creeping immediacy, that Hannibal hadn’t ever really said anything wild or unfathomable to him.

He had said things like, _I hope you believe I wouldn’t lie to you._

_I am uncertain as to how you feel._

_I would also be negligent not to tell you that this is all quite uncommon for me._

Hannibal had said things like, _I couldn’t ask you to put your life on hold for me,_ and _I wouldn’t presume to make this choice for you._

None of that is particularly unbelievable. Hannibal has to have encountered his fair share of groupies at this point in his career, looking and playing the way he does. Will doesn’t have any real reason to take what Hannibal tells him for anything less than full face value, especially now that he’s met Mischa and Hannibal’s met Abigail. In spite of all of that, Will can’t shake the feeling that this paradise they have will dissolve at the slightest push in an unfavorable direction. He won’t be surprised, with his attitude, if it ends up being his fault when it happens.

“You don’t feel real.”

He opens his eyes, realizing he had been resting his head over Hannibal’s heart and listening to the steady beat of it with his eyes closed. Hannibal’s fingers are still in his hair. They don’t falter at Will’s half-conscious declaration.

Calmly, as if he is too familiar with this avenue of discussion, Hannibal asks him, “What does feel real to you?”

“Abigail does, sometimes; my work, the dogs…” He condenses the already short list in his head so as to keep himself from rambling. He decides the only one left that matters is, “Music.”

“That, to you, I can be,” Hannibal murmurs softly, pleased obviously with the answer that ties in so neatly with his own life and personality. Taking up the position of orator in Will’s place, Hannibal begins to make a list of his own that has Will smiling and muffling quiet peals of laughter in the hollow of Hannibal’s shoulder. He says, with a very subtle flourish, “Songbird, metronome, pendulum, at your service.”

Enabling him, Will props himself up over Hannibal’s heart with his arms flat against the blue and green jewel that is the peacock’s body. He has a stupid grin splitting across his face that he has no desire to quash.

“And what, pray tell, would the difference be between a metronome and a pendulum?”

Hannibal thinks about it.

“A pendulum is an aspect of the metronome,” he says matter-of-factly. Catching his error, comically, he closes his eyes and lets his head fall onto the pillow. A faint smile appears on his lips and he says, “Songbird, metronome, conductor, at your service.”

Will grins, wider if possible.

“What are you a conductor of?”

And then Hannibal flips them over, as easily as if Will weighed nothing. Will makes a graceful noise like, “ _Oomf_.”

“Kisses,” Hannibal whispers right as he takes one and then several more from Will. He pinches gently at Will’s ribs and chuckles at the resounding twitch from Will. His body just begins to calm down from the abrupt bit of sensation when Hannibal breathes the word, “Laughter” against his neck.

Will knows what he’ll say next, but he still isn’t prepared for the head rush that floods his brain when Hannibal brushes their hips snugly together and moves. He holds onto Hannibal’s arms, drops his head back, and sighs blissfully. His body starts to respond straight away to Hannibal’s touch, which is both hot and embarrassing, though he would only admit to the latter.

“Sighs and moans,” Hannibal continues in a low register. He kisses Will’s shoulder, and Will’s legs slide further apart to allow him more room in between them. He smirks up at Will and adds, “Curses, if I’m clever enough.”

He slips his fingers around Will’s already interested cock and playfully squeezes once.

Prompted, but also aware of the incentive looming overhead, Will grants him with a breathless, “Fuck.”

“A conductor should know many instruments,” Hannibal muses, voice deeper but still whisper soft. He kisses Will’s cheekbone. “Every person is his own symphony, after all.”

“You are, too.”

“Yes.” Hannibal kisses him on the lips. “I am, too.”

Will hums and winds his arm behind Hannibal’s neck.

“Let’s be music,” he suggests into Hannibal’s throat, sounding hopelessly, hilariously intoxicated.

Hannibal’s eyes shine in the dim moonlit bedroom. Will wraps his legs around his waist and cards his fingers through his hair.

They have their second round of wonderful, quiet sex like that, each ensconced in the other. Hannibal nips at his clavicles and bites harder where he knows Will can take it. They rock back and forth into and through their bodies, sighing and moaning softly with an unspoken but acknowledged understanding about just what it is that’s happening between them. They bind together more tightly as they come undone in the moments before the finish. Will trembles and Hannibal forces him in closer so he can only hold on and be still even as he feels he might shake right out of his skin.

It takes some time for him to calm down after, but not because his body can’t handle the strain. Where it felt comfortable and relaxed when they experimented with the rope, the encounter this time only feels final, and the temporality of it stirs a nagging restlessness inside of Will that Hannibal detects but doesn’t investigate. He doesn’t ask any questions or make any comments. He just holds Will to his side and combs his fingers through his hair and doesn’t mention the four months that he will be gone once he departs in the morning.

It’s very late when Will feels peaceful enough to try sleeping, but even then he doesn’t want to. The nearer the dawn is to them, the sooner Hannibal will leave.

Hannibal has to leave absurdly early anyway to make the drive to the airport. Will is glad he won’t have to take him, as that would be even worse to have to say goodbye in front of the rest of Nemean Lion. He can’t say anything definitively, of course, but he doesn’t think they would be exactly kind to Will or to whatever this thing is that he has with Hannibal that might not be a relationship but really kind of is in most of the ways that matter.

He resolves not to sleep and not to check the clock either. Hannibal drifts in and out beside him, and Will feels guilty about that, but Hannibal assures him several times he would prefer to sleep on the plane.

Will knows when Hannibal is fighting the next wave of sleep when his fingers pulse against his scalp with the involuntary jerk of someone pulled out of a dream. Hannibal sighs and resituates himself behind Will’s back, fiddling with his left arm so it can rest more comfortably beneath Will’s side. Will rolls over, first onto his back and then onto his right side so he can face Hannibal, grateful that they actually put on some clothes this time around.

His shirt brushes Hannibal’s unclothed chest, and he feels slightly like a coward but thinks it’s okay that he covers up a bit as a reflection of his trepidation about their pending separation. He tucks his head underneath Hannibal’s chin.

_Songbird, metronome, conductor,_ Will thinks.

“Are you awake?”

“Yes.”

Just barely Hannibal answers, but he does answer.

“Will you sing to me?”

“What should I sing to you?” Hannibal yawns, chest pressing up against Will’s. His arms tighten around him until his hold relaxes automatically with his deep exhalation. “One of Schubert’s arias,” he muses, nuzzling Will’s temple haphazardly. “Something of the jazz variety—or no,” he backtracks, reconsidering. “No, a blues piece for you.”

“Sing Ray Charles,” Will requests with a soft smile on his face. He doesn’t specify a song as he wants Hannibal to select one that he personally likes, but of course, as he is so wont to do, Hannibal exceeds his expectations.

He chooses Georgia On My Mind.

“Georgia, Georgia, the whole day through; just an old sweet song keeps Georgia on my mind. I say Georgia, Georgia. A song of you comes as sweet and clear as moonlight through the pines.”

Will flicks his gaze over Hannibal’s arm without moving from his place to look at the moon just outside the window. Seeming to understand that Will has made the connection to the song that Hannibal anticipated, Hannibal slides his fingers over the bend in Will’s elbow. The touch is a reminder and a token: it says, _I’m still here, I haven’t gone yet._

“Other arms reach out to me; other eyes smile tenderly. Still, in peaceful dreams I see the road leads back to you. I said Georgia, oh, Georgia. No peace I find. Just an old sweet song keeps Georgia on my mind.”

He taps intentionally at Will’s arm, waiting, or perhaps testing to see if Will is still awake since he has long since stopped fidgeting so tirelessly.

Will nestles in closer against Hannibal’s collar bone but turns his face to one side so his cheek presses into Hannibal’s skin. His voice isn’t muffled when he sings back, “Other arms reach out to me. Other eyes smile tenderly. Still, in peaceful dreams I see the road leads back to you.”

“Oh, Georgia, Georgia,” Hannibal continues, overlapping enough for Will to understand that it wasn’t accidental.

“No peace,” Will murmurs.

“No peace I find,” Hannibal finishes the line, creating layers between his voice and Will’s. His voice lifts slightly at the end as if to cue Will in, but Will doesn’t need the hint. He knows already to pick up after Hannibal sings, “Just an old sweet song.”

“Keeps Georgia on my mind.”

“Just an old sweet song,” Hannibal whispers.

And Will can’t do it because it’s the same grace note of permanence and finality that he feels shivering its way into this beautiful, spontaneous duet they’ve created and shared, so he raises his chin and kisses Hannibal instead. He kisses him firmly with no room for doubt. It’s a kiss that says, _You finish it now because it’s too much for me. You finish it now because you know I can’t yet and I don’t even have to tell you._

Because it’s all true exactly the way Will articulated it in the sanctity of his thoughts, Hannibal does finish it, and he doesn’t ask or comment here either. He doesn’t because there’s no need. He does only what Will has left him in charge of doing. He sings, “Keeps sweet Georgia on my mind.”

He kisses Will again, a few more times after that before they attempt speaking again. It’s Hannibal who breaks the not-silence of their lazy kisses and casual touches. He breaks it while tracing the bottom ridge of Will’s lip with one finger to say, “This smile, this one.”

“What about it?”

Will slurs his words when he’s sleepy, and he’s slurring them now, though he tries very hard to enunciate. He licks his lips out of habit and gets Hannibal’s finger in the process. It isn’t sexual or greedy, but it does kick a bit of warmth back into his stomach where, admittedly, the warmth never really calmed down to begin with. It’s the act of unintentionally wetting Hannibal’s finger with his tongue that he even registers the pull of a sated, uninhibited smile the full way across his mouth. He keeps it right where it is for Hannibal’s viewing pleasure, mostly because it doesn’t flicker or quiver once, not even after he’s become aware of it.

“It is my magnum opus.”

That smile, Hannibal’s self-proclaimed _magnum opus_ broadens into another stupid grin. Will covers his face with one hand and laughs, thrilled and stunned and baffled and foolishly, irrevocably in love.

“It would be, wouldn’t it?”

Hannibal smiles back at him and rewards his favorable reaction with many more kisses than Will can really handle accepting being as tired as he is, but he doesn’t refuse a single one. Each flutter of lips and every flick of Hannibal’s tongue is precious.

When the first signs of dawn come, and of course they do, Hannibal reluctantly untangles himself from Will’s lethargic, half-useless limbs and doesn’t speak. Will forces himself to sit up while Hannibal dresses himself in the brightening darkness. When Hannibal’s properly clothed, he comes and sits before Will on the bed and places a hand on Will’s bent knee. His hand is comfortable on Will’s skin and his presence strongly desired. Will leans forward a ways and steals a kiss, not satisfied with how many more Hannibal has stolen from him.

“When you get back—” Will starts to say but then stops himself. “Um, just…Let me know if this is…”

“I’ll call you when I land in Munich,” Hannibal says definitively. He speaks confidently and without pause as if he had decided much earlier than this morning. “I will call you often.”

Will tries not to seem too relieved at not having to ask, but Hannibal is holding his face in his hands and looking at him like he was before. He’s giving him that look like he expects Will to be gone in the next instant, swallowed up by some mysterious force that exists in Hannibal to consume other people. It doesn’t frighten Will this time. In fact, how leveled and grounded he feels makes him question why he felt uneasy in the first place. He feels safe with Hannibal’s hands on him. He hopes Hannibal feels that same relief and security. He hopes it isn’t a completely unhealthy attachment to develop with someone he can’t honestly say he knows very well.

If Abigail were in his place, he knows how much he would distrust the guy that had her so entranced. He can’t help but criticize himself, even as the magic seeps directly into his jaw from Hannibal’s fingers.

“I’ll hold you to that,” Will says instead of, _Please._

“I hope you do,” Hannibal replies softly, perhaps instead of, _You’re welcome._

Will lets Hannibal go when he sets to go and doesn’t follow him out of the room. He doesn’t want to wave from the door as he drives off down the street like a housewife. He’s also pretty certain Mischa will have risen early to see her brother off, and Will really doesn’t want to impose on their farewells in just his underwear and a t-shirt.

He looks down at his lap at the tiny shorts and frowns a little bit to himself. No, it wouldn’t do to scandalize Hannibal’s sister by walking around in tiny shorts after spending the night fantastically with the woman’s brother.

For lack of a desire to get out of Hannibal’s bed that still retains their combined heat and smell, Will curls back up under the blankets. He lets himself be tugged under that heavy curtain of sleep he avoided all night for the purpose of being with Hannibal every second that he could be. He turns the alerts on his phone up so any text or call will wake him and distantly hopes that Abigail and Mischa will have breakfast without him in the event that no call or text comes.

It’s an easy thing not to worry about Hannibal once sleep finds him. He taps his fingers faintly over imaginary keys and hums a song that has irreversibly become his and Hannibal’s as he sinks beneath consciousness.

The sun comes in through the open window, but it’s all soft warmth and whispered promises and it doesn’t wake him.

Instead he dreams of mongooses and lions; he dreams of black smoke that unfurls into the hazy form of a stag.

He dreams of Hannibal’s harpsichord beside his piano at home and dreams they’re playing them together. A few times the roaring of a plane flying overhead nearly brings him back to the world of the living, but even that ruckus isn’t strong enough to tear him out of their music. In a rare moment of lucidity, he takes that resilience as a sign and slips deeper into a content, undisturbed slumber.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Georgia On My Mind, as noted in-story, by Ray Charles


	10. Around And Around

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone deals with Hannibal's departure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Well the joint stayed a rocking/Goin' round and round/Yeah, reeling and a rocking/What a crazy sound/And they never stopped rocking/ Til the moon went down_

He wakes up not to his phone chiming or buzzing but to the smell of peppery, spicy sausage cooking downstairs. The door has been cracked open at some point in his sleep and the folded up duvet taken out of the room. Will rouses himself to sit upright and panic slightly at the thought that Mischa might have come in to take their soiled blankets to the wash. He gets dressed quickly, fumbles on his shoes and glasses, and pockets his phone before turning to tidy up the bed. Hannibal keeps a clean enough room anyway that it looks fine even with the rumpled sheets staring up at Will accusingly to match the faint ache in his lower back and wrists.

He takes a few minutes more to straighten out the corners here and there and then ducks into the bathroom to gargle, and accidentally swallow, some minty mouthwash. He runs wet fingers through his hair and decides he looks presentable enough.

Will heads down the stairs to meet Abigail and Mischa in the kitchen where the smell of food is coming from. Abigail is sitting on a stool pulled up to the shiny black kitchen island and Mischa is sitting atop it on the other side swinging her legs back and forth over the edge. He blinks back the feeling of déjà vu and fails at waving Mischa off when she goes to serve him a plate of eggs in baskets, hash browns, and sausage.

Abigail pulls out the chair beside her and he sits. Both of them look much more awake than Will feels, but they chatter in quiet voices about the slight chill outside and what the day holds. Will just listens, grateful that they don’t put any kind of pressure on him to contribute to the conversation.

They end up back in Hannibal’s library so Mischa can hear him play the harpsichord once more before they leave. She has to be at the tattoo shop for her shift in a few hours and Will needs to get home to feed the dogs anyway, so he doesn’t worry that they’ll be held up very long. Besides, he enjoys playing for Abigail, and he gets the feeling that Mischa doesn’t want to be left alone in this big house for much longer than she needs to.

He plays a few songs while she looks on, intrigued, at the way his fingers dance across the keys she can’t bend to her will no matter what she does. Abigail wanders around looking at the multitude of books on every shelf and finally gazing out the large window into the backyard.

“How long have you played?”

He shrugs, not really knowing a precise answer to give.

“I used to hog the practice rooms during free periods at school. We moved around a lot, but most high schools I went to had at least one Steinway holed up in a closet somewhere.”

“You’re self-taught?”

“Well, not exactly.” He takes his hands away but places them back when she frowns at the loss of the music. She seems even more fascinated that he can speak and play at the same time, so he carries on with a small smile on his face, delighted to be the focus of such a harmless pair of eyes. “I took classes in college, but I had an early start; knew all the notes.”

“You are self-taught,” she says, around a good-natured smirk.

He laughs and doesn’t try to argue this time.

“Uncle said you played other strings.” Her voice is naturally casual, all the impossible, devious innocence of a child. Will must make some kind of face at the mention of Robertus because she adds, “Oh, yes, he told me all about your singing and Hannibal’s forgetting his saxophone.”

She smiles, and the imprecise, slightly lopsided curve of it is the very essence of calm. It is the exact center of Hannibal’s peace. He shouldn’t know it, but he thinks he probably would even if he had been born a less perceptive man. Mischa must see this realization flutter across his face, too, because her features soften and she sits beside him on the bench.

“I told you Hannibal had a habit of consuming the people he gets close to,” she reminds him softly. “What did you think I meant when I said that?”

“Honestly you made him sound like a cannibal.”

Her laugh surprises him because he can tell it surprises her. She presses her fingers to her lips and settles down before turning to give him a warm, helplessly entertained look.

“Well, he’s mysterious enough to be, I suppose.” She laughs. “To my knowledge he does nothing of the sort.”

“To your knowledge,” Will chuckles in spite of himself. She nudges him in the ribs, and it feels much too familiar for this to be their first time really sitting down with each other and visiting.

“He can be overbearing,” she confesses with a smile in her voice that almost causes Will to overlook what she’s just said. She sobers up a bit and plays a C note to the far right of the keys Will’s hands have since halted over. He looks at her finger depressing the key and then at his hands before starting up another song, legato in tempo and pianissimo in tone. Mischa continues, “He looked after me when we were children, after our parents died in the plane crash.”

He glances at her. She smiles softly at his concern.

“I don’t remember them really; Hannibal was old enough to have memories of them, but I wasn’t.”

“He didn’t tell me about the plane crash,” he whispers, looking over his shoulder to look for Abigail.

She has since nestled into a plush armchair with a very heavy-looking book occupying the full space of her lap. She doesn’t notice his gaze and yawns big before turning a page and reclining further into the huge chair. He turns back to Mischa, fingers still ambling distractedly about the G minor scale.

“He probably didn’t tell you anything about our childhood,” she murmurs, eyes dropping to the keys. He averts his eyes when he sees her swallow hard enough that he can hear it.

“I know he had a…” He pauses guiltily, questioning whether he should mention it. “He said he broke his arm, as a boy.”

The vivacious spark in Mischa’s eyes dims, and he immediately feels cold on the inside. 

“I don’t know—I…He didn’t tell me anything more,” he stammers, one hand searching out her arm on reflex. The notes cut off abruptly, and he knows Abigail must be watching them now, though he didn’t hear her get up from the chair. “It’s his business. I don’t need to know anything before he’s ready to tell me, Mischa, please.”

He doesn’t know for what he’s pleading. He just wants that distant pain to stop hollowing out her eyes and taking her away.

It’s that same place toward which Hannibal retreated when he had first explained his tattoo, _M for Mischa._

“What’s happened in the past is in the past,” she finally says, bolstering some of her trademark, mirthful honesty and soothing Will’s worry like a balm. She covers her hand with his, fingers warm and sure, artist’s fingers. In a splintered voice she whispers, “I’m sorry about that.”

“No, no, I’m sorry. It’s none of my business what happened to you.”

“Nor is it mine what happened to you,” she murmurs with a small smile on her quivering lips. Her eyes glisten with the very real promise of tears, but none come. Her pain is old enough and deep enough to be suffered continually beneath the happiness and beneath the laughter. Her voice is still small, and he hates how helpless it makes him feel. “I wish I didn’t know.”

“The only person that I wish didn’t know is that journalist.” He tries to laugh, but the ring of it is too hard to sound lighthearted.

“I think Hannibal will want you to know what happened, in time.”

“You mean after these four months,” he replies, already feeling much lighter for the change of pace that bends their conversation more toward Hannibal and away from either of them. “If he doesn’t decide this was just a fling after all.”

The hard look she gives him makes him instantly regret his callousness. He meant it but probably not the way his tone suggested he did. Mischa’s tone matches his and he flinches away from it.

“Was this just a fling for you?”

“No.”

His quiet admission mollifies her on the spot, and he feels much better as a result.

“Well, it wasn’t for him either.”

He sighs and plays around a bit more on the harpsichord, enjoying the funny, unique clangs of the plectra plucking the strings and leaving the sounds to waft around them as solidly and intangibly as wisps of smoke or fragrance. She had never tensed beside him or shifted away, but he can feel that the mood between them has transitioned into something companionable again.

He says, “I play the viola.”

Mischa looks at him.

“That’s my string of choice.”

“You’re full of surprises, Will Graham.”

“Thank you.” He smiles when she does. “You’re none too predictable yourself, Mischa Lecter.”

He plays around for a while longer on the keys until Abigail walks up behind them and informs them of the time. The younger Lecter sibling walks out with them and it’s only then that Will realizes she’s been strolling about the house in a black silk kimono robe. He had thought it was a dress, but upon closer inspection—really, when she pulls him in for a hug in the driveway—he notices her bare feet and the loose tie of the sash and feels an embarrassed flush creeping up on him.

“Oh, please, as if your first impulse wasn’t to strut about in your underwear.”

Will stammers as if to deny it but just snaps his mouth shut instead. She gives Abigail a tight hug, too, and grins at Will all the while.

“Have a safe drive,” she tells him as she pulls away from the embrace, suddenly serious. “Hannibal told me you live something like an hour away.”

Will nods and says he’ll be careful. She stays on the porch to watch them until they pull out onto the street and then turns to go for the door. Will drives off once she’s inside and the door has been shut safely behind her. For the first few streets he deludes himself into thinking they’ll have a quiet drive ahead of them, but Abigail wants to talk; of course, she does.

Well, she wants to tease him is what she wants, but she gives him a few opportunities every now and again to speak for himself. It’s endearing as it is mortifying.

“I heard him leaving this morning; you should have heard her, oh, my God. I think if anyone could die of embarrassment he would have. She’s a pro; I’ve got to take tips from her.”

Apparently Abigail had gotten up for the bathroom right as Hannibal was leaving, and she had been privileged with overhearing the merciless teasing going on downstairs over parting cups of coffee.

“Younger siblings are good for that, I’ve heard,” Will mumbles, smiling even though he and Abigail are both only children.

“Was everything okay with you guys, before?”

He shifts in his seat and waits to get into the middle lane of the freeway before speaking.

“Yeah, we were just talking about…” He searches for an accurate explanation to give to her that won’t be too much of a breach of privacy. “Yesterday Hannibal told me about an injury he got when he was a kid. We were talking about scars.”

She nods once when he locks eyes with her for a moment before turning back to the road.

He says, in a bit of an understatement, “It was a sensitive topic.”

“I guess they don’t share it with people very often.”

He shrugs, but he wants to say, _Not ever._

He shouldn’t know that either, but he doesn’t feel like he could _not_ know with how raw the hurt is when put into so many words.

Abigail asks him to take an exit off the 267 and onto the 7 once they’re nearly home. He just smiles and drives the rest of the way to the craft store unguided. He gets out with her and walks with her down the aisles to the paints, the nice ones that cost a little bit more. She buys those and a few canvas panels on which to paint. He offers to buy them for her, but she uses the debit card with the money her parents left her with when they died.

She hasn’t touched it since the family’s lawyers first talked it over with her when she woke up in the hospital.

They leave the store and Will’s arms are filled with huge stiff canvas panels and a plastic bag looped around his wrist also filled with smaller tubes of bright neon paints. Abigail pops the trunk and helps him with the canvases, setting down the bag of a dozen or so acrylic paints and several different types of brushes.

She drives them home and they discuss what’ll be on for dinner tonight. At her suggestion he concedes to try his hand at chicken cacciatore, which is supposed to be an easy dish. It’s supposed to be, or she’s lying her ass off in which case he’ll try to make it anyway and they can just order a pizza if he screws it up. They drop off her purchases in the hall and Will deals with feeding his seven hungry, excitable dogs while Abigail writes him a list of things he’ll need to pick up from the market as soon as all of her stuff is secured in her room where the dogs won’t get it.

He sets out with the list and doesn’t dally once he gets to the store. He’s all business every time he goes anywhere by himself, so this trip isn’t any different. She sent him for chicken, bell peppers, garlic cloves, tomatoes, and mushrooms, so he gets those first before wandering around purposely for other things they’ll need around the kitchen. Nobody tries to talk to him on his way out, so he promptly heads home once he’s done. He drives with the radio off and the windows down and he tries to picture the weather in Germany right now.

Hannibal wouldn’t be in Germany just yet but maybe he’d be close. Maybe he’d be dead asleep and Don or Bedelia would draw on his face and take pictures for later blackmail. He clings to the hope that in the event there are pictures that exist of Hannibal with whiskers drawn on his face in black permanent marker they will go into Hannibal’s phone and send them to Will.

Just because.

He never said he was a saint.

Abigail takes the groceries off his hands when he walks into the house and stocks the perishables in the refrigerator, anticipating that he’ll want to take a shower. Her own hair drips onto the shoulders of the oversized t-shirt she’s wearing. Probably because her hair is still drying she’s opted not to wear a scarf, not that he looks. She’s been out and about without that barrier between them before.

She lingers in the kitchen removing lemons from the fridge, maybe to make lemonade. He doesn’t want to stay and gawk at her unnecessarily, so he goes to get fresh clothes from his room and a towel from the linen closet.

He’s quick in the shower and keeps his phone nearby atop the pile of his clothes in case Hannibal calls or texts him—in case _someone_ calls or texts, he corrects internally.

Actually, he had been wondering if Ratner would call him and arrange to see him sooner than their scheduled appointment in two weeks. He figured all this attention might have given her cause to think, like Jack, that he was ready to go back to work. He doesn’t expect Harris to fold, though, since he’ll need physical therapy when he needs it regardless of what’s written about him online or elsewhere.

He would have to tell Harris his shoulder doesn’t feel quite as stiff as it did before, but then, he hadn’t tried to hold a violin there, much less a viola. Whatever Ratner says about his recovery, Harris will be the one to decide if he’s ready for work at the end of this month.

He hopes he will be fighting fit by then, especially now that he has something, some _one_ , he’s waiting for.

No one calls or texts him while he’s in the shower. He tries not to think about it too much and gets dressed once he’s out and dry. He nearly drops the sloppy pile of his dirty clothes when he walks out of the bathroom to see Abigail carrying a neat bundle of paintbrushes out of her room and into the den, Simon and Winston following after curiously.

He stops in the doorway of his room and watches her make another trip to her room for a waist-high easel. Over her shoulder she asks him, “Do you mind if I paint out here?”

The big t-shirt suddenly makes sense.

Of course he doesn’t mind. He dumps his clothes in a hamper and rubs the towel through his hair once more before tossing it into the laundry room. She has the wooden easel set up over some newspaper and an assortment of paints and brushes on the coffee table along with cups of clear, untouched water. The dogs are circled around her watching the gigantic canvas she’s maneuvering onto the easel.

After another moment of staring indulgently he asks if she’s hungry and throws together a salad when she says she could eat.

He ends up with a modified version of what his dad used to call a Caesar salad but that surpasses his old recipe by about seven ingredients. She sits next to him on the couch and eats over the now-art-cluttered coffee table in comfortable silence. They go back and forth between staring at their bowls and staring at the blank canvas. The dogs mostly make their rounds through the den and the kitchen, making sure nothing funny is going on in the deceptive quiet.

He takes their bowls to the sink and returns to his spot on the couch while Abigail moves to sit on the edge of the coffee table, brush in hand. He checks his watch and decides he has a while to get started on dinner, so he sprawls out to tiredly stretch his legs and shuts his eyes. The boxer, Penelope, snuffles at his head once, but she leaves him be without too much fuss.

Abigail only just starts to paint a sweeping line of pale blue across the midway point of the canvas when he feels sleep tugging inconveniently at him. He drops his head back on the cushion and rubs his eyes with his fingers, setting his glasses down on the coffee table as he does.

“Didn’t get much sleep last night?”

He hears the laugh in her voice, but she doesn’t turn away from the canvas and let him see the matching smile.

“I don’t think I did sleep.”

That gets her to whirl around on him.

“Jeez, that’s probably more than I ever needed to know about you.”

“What? Oh, my God, you asked!”

She bites her lip, shoulders shaking slightly with silent laughter, and plucks his glasses off the table. He drops his hands onto his stomach and huffs a disgruntled noise in between a sigh and a grunt. She slides his glasses on with one hand and continues to paint with the other, slow, swooping lines dividing the white.

“So it’s pretty serious, right?”

He takes a moment to mull over the question, though the answer came to him as soon as the words left her mouth.

“Yeah, it is.”

“That’s good.”

“You think so?”

His glasses make her look comically younger than she is, the way they slide down and dwarf her nose. He doesn’t tell her that for fear that she won’t try to steal them from him anymore, but he always thinks it.

After they’ve been quiet for a while and he starts to feel sleepy again, he asks around a yawn, “Whose idea was it to get into that tree last night, yours or Mischa’s?”

“Well, mine, sort of.” She paints a darker shade of blue through the top of the canvas. He can see her feeling her way through the colors to capture an image from the intermingling pigments. “She saw me looking at it, and she was already telling me all about Boötes and Hercules hunting bears together in the sky—the constellations, I mean. She was really interested in the constellations.”

He had surmised as much, that they had gone up to stargaze. He remembers seeing Mischa gesticulating excitedly at the moon and wondering what it was she could have been seeing.

“What did she say that made you laugh so much?”

Abigail’s laugh now is only a murmur, like she knows he’s in danger of falling asleep and she wants to usher him toward it as gently as possible.

“She said when the moon burns down you have a clearer view of your house.”

He wrinkles his eyebrows, waiting for the punch line. “That makes no sense.”

“Well, she meant to say, when your house burns down, you have a clearer view of the moon. I guess it’s a Japanese saying.”

He chuckles, thinking about the eloquent Mischa Lecter misspeaking and then turning her mistake into a joke. He thinks of Hannibal, how he’s so put together and how he must have been the one to train that characteristic grace that they share into her. He thinks about all the small things that were Mischa’s first that Hannibal managed to pick up by watching her.

Her natural propensity for honesty, to name one thing, is second nature for her and a learned skill of Hannibal’s that he is less generous in expressing. Will had seen it, though; he had seen that Hannibal could be withholding if he wanted to be but that he preferred to be blunt and forthcoming.

There is also the matter of whatever it is that they both do, he thinks unconsciously, to draw people in and keep them there if that’s where they want them to be. For Hannibal it’s a switch; a defense mechanism; a safeguard. For Mischa it’s a phantom limb twitching without her consent and without her awareness but stinging with just as much intensity if not more than it does for Hannibal.

He learned affection from Mischa, too. He learned how to touch with kindness when the world he survived as a boy hadn’t taught him to accept it or to give it. She taught him how to be gracious and how to be genuine.

She’s the one who taught him that _feeling_ could be enough of a reason to take a chance on a perfect stranger.

Will wakes up to insistent buzzing on his stomach and the smells of oregano, garlic, and the salty aroma of chicken cooking. He blinks his eyes open to the picture of him and Hannibal in bed together and accepts the call before he’s all the way awake.

He can be forgiven for humming his greeting more than properly enunciating. Hannibal laughs at him, sounding energetic and rested. Will wishes he could touch him.

“Did I wake you?”

“Yes,” he mumbles, scrubbing his free hand down his face. His glasses are on the coffee table beside cleaned brushes and capped tubes of paint. The cups of water have been removed, no water rings remaining in their absence. He fumbles his glasses back on his face and lies back down. “How was the flight?”

“It was very long.”

“Oh, was it.”

“I slept for much of it.”

“You said you would.”

He presses his lips together when he can feel Hannibal smiling through the faulty connection. He must still be in the airport or somewhere equally crowded. The bad reception pairs together with the noisy environment and makes it harder to hear him.

“Should I call you later, Will?”

He sits up, arm propped up against the back of the couch. Abigail is fluttering about in the kitchen in her big t-shirt, now spotted down the front with green and brown paint. She smiles when she catches him squinting at her.

“Will?”

He’s openly laughing at him now, damn him. Will groans, a soft, quiet sound, and slumps against the back of the couch, way more tired than he fairly should be.

“I’m up,” he says, swinging his legs off the edge of the couch. “I’m…awake.”

He looks at the familiar backyard of Hannibal’s house as reproduced on the canvas now fully adorned in greens, blues, grays, and browns. Toward the bottom are two black figures entwined together in a sideways embrace, him and Hannibal. He can make out the shaky silhouettes of Mischa and Abigail in the green of the oak tree. Just above the tallest branches he can see the silver-white pinpricks of stars forming both Boötes and Hercules together in the sky.

He just gawps silently for a few seconds, breathless with the urgency of it. It’s rough around the edges, like a drawing done quickly on a bar napkin. He imagines how much cleaner it could be if she took her time with it; he can see all the places where the lines and colors would meet more abruptly to create a sturdier reflection of Hannibal’s yard. It could be just like a photograph, he’s certain.

“Oh, sorry,” he blurts out, realizing he’s been quiet and Hannibal has no idea why. “Abigail painted your backyard, and it’s gorgeous.”

Hannibal sounds pleased and he doesn’t miss a beat.

“Might I have the privilege of seeing it?”

“I’ll ask. I think we’re having dinner in a minute.”

“Try twenty,” she calls from the kitchen.

A hot blush climbs up the side of his neck and she grins at him when he turns to look at her.

“Well, in twenty minutes we’re eating. I’ll get back to you.” He stands, wobbly on his feet, and makes for his bedroom, anticipating that if Hannibal hasn’t hung up on him yet it might be because there’s more he wants to say. Before retreating into the hall he asks if Abigail needs him to do anything, but she politely dismisses him with a shake of her head and a soft smile of which he’s beginning to suspect himself deserving. To Hannibal he asks, “Have you gotten settled in yet?”

“We’re taking a cab now to the hotel.” He says something, presumably to the driver, in German. Will doesn’t know the language well enough to judge how proficient in the language Hannibal is, but he appears to be the only one of his group to have any kind of knack for it. “Don and Bedelia took the one ahead of mine; I was lucky enough to ride with Bryn and Abel. They’re much more accommodating.”

“Does either Don or Bedelia speak German?”

“Both of them do, though Donald’s grasp of it is much better than Bedelia’s. Her language of choice has always been French.”

“You, of course, know both.”

“Yes,” he says quietly, the admission punctuated by the opening and slamming of car doors. “I am now safely at my destination,” Hannibal announces with some amount of bravado that brings a smile to Will’s face.

“Not safe until you’re inside.” Will flops down onto his bed, ruffling his slightly damp hair with one hand and huffing around the stretch in his shoulders. He’s starting to feel sore in a few particular places. With a devious kind of interest Will asks, “Did you get your own room?”

“I did,” Hannibal answers suspiciously. “What did you have in mind?”

“Oh, you know.”

He doesn’t, but Hannibal appears to.

“Will, I’m amazed at you.” His tone suggests he’s more amused than amazed, but Will will take what he can get. “Would you challenge my virtue thus?”

Will casually reminds him, “My challenging your virtue is the backbone of our relationship.”

“So it is.”

He hears pinging like one would hear boarding an elevator.

Will just listens for a while as Hannibal shifts around and moves through the hotel. He can hear luggage being hefted about and a man’s voice saying something in English with Hannibal’s name attached to the end. Hannibal says, “Yes, but check with Don. He may have a shellfish allergy. I always forget.”

A woman says, laughing, “That’s right. You _forget_.”

Will imagines air quotes around the word.

“His safety is very important to me,” Hannibal says, pretending to be highly offended. He sniffs. “His allergies are many and difficult to keep track of.”

“You never forget mine,” drawls his male companion, probably Abel. “But then, mine don’t change with the phases of the moon.”

_When your house burns down you have a clearer view of the moon._

Will rolls over onto his back and listens to them chatter aimlessly about Don’s alleged aversions to wheat, almonds, all types of shellfish, and milk. From the way Hannibal’s tone changes slightly when he mentions almonds and lobster specifically, Will can tell that he actually believes Don is allergic to them.

“Best if we avoid the shellfish then, I guess,” the woman, Bryn, says. She sounds relieved.

Abel says, in a sage, prophetic type of voice, “Or maybe I’ll just ditch the four of you and roam this city like a hound off his leash.” And then grumbling, “And then I can eat whatever I want.”

“Certainly don’t let us stop you.”

Will can hear Hannibal’s smile again. He deduces from it that Abel takes himself and his band mates this seriously all the time and that his solemnity has become something of a fond inside joke.

He smiles.

Abel says in that same lingering voice, “Is your steady still on the line?”

His smile wavers just as he can detect Hannibal’s limbs locking up through the phone.

“Why?”

Louder and with a coy lilt to his words, he says, “It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Graham.”

“Um,” Will says because it seems to matter that he respond. “Hello?”

“He says hello,” Hannibal mutters, fiddling audibly with something metallic and jingly, probably a room key. “He also wants for me to warn you that knowing your allergies is the same thing as knowing how to inexpensively poison you.”

Will makes an alarmed noise of protest. Abel guffaws. A door opens and closes.

“I apologize for that. He is abrasive when it suits him to be.”

“Does it ever, in your company?”

“No,” Hannibal mumbles, dropping a heavy-sounding suitcase and flipping on a light switch. “Not really.”

“What does he play?”

“He is our keyboard. I should have threatened to replace his hands with yours. You play much better than he does.”

Will laughs and distantly mourns the loss of his modesty.

“I’m not really a performer.”

Hannibal hums. “No, I suppose you aren’t.”

Abigail knocks on his door and pokes her head in after a beat. She tells him dinner’s ready and then pulls the door quietly shut as she ducks back into the hallway.

“You will have to challenge my virtue another time, it seems.” 

Another time.

“What time is it over there?”

“Nearly one in the morning.”

“Oh.”

“Yes, well, it was a twelve hour flight and there is a difference of six hours between us.”

“So are you just going to…stay awake then?”

“Why?” Hannibal’s voice is warm, coaxing. “Did you want to call me after your meal?”

“I…” Will pushes to sit up. He licks his lips. “Well, if you can’t sleep. Yeah, you should try to sleep. If you can’t, um, then call me. In an hour, or something, if you want.”

Hannibal doesn’t tease him about his stammering. They hang up and Will goes out to sit with Abigail at the table. She made penne pasta while he was on the phone with Hannibal and serves the hunter’s chicken over it. The whole thing emits steam and smells wonderful.

He wishes Hannibal could have some since it’s every bit as delicious as he suspects it will be just going off appearances. It makes a sweet picture in his head, Abigail and Hannibal flitting soundlessly about the kitchen together while Will sits on the counter swinging his legs with Mischa next to him drinking Hannibal’s wine and calling him a goose. It’s domestic, he realizes. He’s never thought of his life as domestic before.

Maybe that was due, in part, to his _Wildman_ brand of existence out here in isolation with his dogs, the stream, and the woods.

Something about having someone here with him, sending him to do the shopping and cluttering his home with art supplies and defining his night by the sole fact of whether or not she’s decided to wear a scarf or not has made his life into something soft and warm that it wasn’t before. It’s nothing to do with Abigail being feminine, though she is, even if there are rugged sorts of things she can do better than he can—hunting, climbing, cleaning and polishing guns, etc.

It’s more that he’s never felt tethered in his place before. He grew up with half his roots yanked too early to produce fruits and half of them never in the soil to begin with, and his life had been that way, too, up until he got the job working for Jack in Quantico.

First there was the problem of his old rented place not allowing pets and then there was the problem of noisy tenants in the apartment he tried to keep, and then once he finally felt settled in this new home, there had been the transfer from the teeny music shop in Arlington to the sprawling music academy of Quantico. By then he’d had dogs and a trail to take them walking behind the house and running water in which to fish.

And then Garrett Jacob Hobbs had happened and given Will both the best and the worst things he could have had in his life.

The worst of it was the friction: the press harassing him like an evil poltergeist, the uncertainty of whether he would be able to continue his life here or whether he would need to go on the move again, the crippling fear of losing Abigail to the coma when he’d so nearly let her slip through his fingers in her old kitchen that day.

The best of it was Abigail herself: her light, her mercy, the hearth she brought into his icy home.

And now he had Hannibal, too.

Even if he sometimes hated Garrett Jacob Hobbs for everything that happened, he had to admit, to himself only, that the storm had made his life bountiful where it had never been before. The hurricane brought with it an unprecedented harvest.

Abigail watches him chew and stare critically at his plate for a while before she draws him out of his thoughts and back to the dinner table. She pours him lemonade as a precursor to conversation. It’s sweet and cold in the glass.

“What are you thinking about?”

He doesn’t want to tell her he’s thinking about her father. He’s not, really, if he looks passed the dead man to the girl sitting expectantly across from him.

“You.”

A surprised smile breaks out across her face. He doesn’t look, but her neck is still unadorned and her hair has finished drying.

“You’re always thinking about me,” she muses.

He shrugs and takes another sip of his lemonade. It’s true.

“What are you going to call it?” She looks over his shoulder into the den when he angles his head that way toward her painting.

She thinks about it for a long time and he lets her but he can see the answer waiting on her lips long before she breathes it to life.

“Lecter Castle,” she murmurs distantly.

He twists to look at the painting, a blurry but exact rendition of the picture he has stored in his mind. It does look like a castle, the very edges of the roof giving off the appearance of a protective bastion keeping them sheltered from enemy attacks. The shaded figures meant to represent Will and Hannibal look like royalty, and the two shades in the branches look like angels hiding themselves away for the purpose of spying on them.

His heart clenches at how profoundly their worlds have come together and murmurs, “I like that.”

“Regality suits them,” she agrees.

He has to laugh because yes, it really does. Instead of asking why his chest should hurt at that thought, he focuses on his food. He doesn’t tell her that Hannibal’s uncle is a count so they’re probably vaguely royal in their own right.

The chicken is tastier than chicken has any right to be, so he just savors it and enjoys sitting with her and being quiet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eggs in Baskets  
> http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/eggs-in-baskets-recipe/index.html
> 
> Caesar Salad  
> http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/caesar_salad/
> 
> Perfect Lemonade  
> http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/perfect_lemonade/
> 
> Chicken Cacciatore (Hunter Chicken)  
> http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/chicken_cacciatore_hunter_style_chicken/
> 
> I have always spelled it GEEZE, and apparently I am a fool because the internet tells me it’s JEEZ. I ain't got no game.


	11. Hot Stuff

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life goes on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Music make you forget all your trouble/Make you sing and make you tell the whole wide world/So what?_

Will goes to see Dr. Ratner for their scheduled appointment early Wednesday afternoon. Abigail calls him as he’s walking into the building to ask where he stashed the new dog treats he bought. He tells her they’re in the cabinet next to the refrigerator behind the unopened bag of pretzels.

He hears her breaking into that bag and pouring some into a bowl after taking down the box of treats.

“Not too many, or they’ll get sick,” he warns distractedly, standing near the entrance so as not to disturb the few people sitting in the waiting area. “There’s a Frisbee outside somewhere, I think, unless it got thrown into one of the trees.”

“I found it last week under the hose.”

He smiles to himself, remembering the first time he caught her tossing it around for the dogs. That had been a lifetime ago, when he was still mostly high to the eyes on Percocet and they were barely on speaking terms.

“Okay, good luck with the doctor.”

“Thanks,” he mumbles, looking around the office surreptitiously and then at his watch for the time. “Wear your boots if you go outside. As funny as it was the last time your shoe got stuck in the mud, you probably don’t want that happening again.”

“That was _one_ time.”

He bites his lip around his grin and ends the call to the sound of laughter and dogs trotting toward the shaking treat box. Will makes his way to the chairs nearest the exit and sits with his fingers clasped over his stomach, one knee bouncing silently as he waits.

It’s a typical visit with Ratner today; just routine, no big deal. If everything goes well they won’t have to do it again for a while. The last time they talked medication. This time they’re going to talk physical therapy, which has been a much slower process than he would have liked going into it. He hears his name and powers his phone down as he makes his way through the hallway to a sterile, bright room that he’s been in before.

He sits on the examination table, paper lining crinkling noisily as he shifts. His knee bounces.

Ratner walks in a moment later and greets him warmly. He’s met quite a few physicians over the course of his life for various reasons, so he’s seen all sorts. He’s dealt with cold, clinical types, he’s seen brutish, genius types, he’s seen calm, motherly types, and he’s seen bad doctors—who really come in all shapes and sizes and can be the nicest or the cruelest of people.

He’s never really had a doctor like Ratner, though, which is great because he doesn’t know how he would have handled this whole getting shot ordeal if he had had to do it with someone else. She manages to care while always keeping it professional. That being said, years and years of hatred for doctors’ offices keeps Will from ever feeling comfortable in any place that looks like this one with its bright, shiny walls, unforgiving lighting, and the multitude of tongue depressors stashed in a huge glass jar.

_Nope._

She rubs at the chest piece of the stethoscope around her neck and asks him how physical therapy is going. He says, “Oh, what you’d expect.”

“Still stiff through the shoulder?”

“No, that feels a lot better.”

“You’re meeting with Harris again today, yes?”

“Yeah,” he mumbles, unbuttoning his shirt so she can place the warmed metal over his sternum and reposition it a few times until she’s satisfied. He waits until she takes it away to speak again. “We’re nearing the end of that, right? It’ll be seven weeks soon.”

She gives him a blank look over her clipboard, pen still going.

His voice isn’t very strong when he says, “The number you agreed to was six.”

“Well, it’s up to Harris, but your body’s going to be the deciding factor here, not a timestamp on a document.”

Will sighs and buttons his shirt up. Ratner pulls the stool over and sits before him.

“Now then, tell me about Hannibal Lecter.”

He balks, face and neck burning. “What? That’s hardly…”

“Will, I’m your doctor.” She wears an unexpressive face, mouth set in a soft but straight line. “This is not a social call, okay? I’m asking if you’re sexually active, and if the answer to that question is yes, then I need to know you’re not overexerting yourself.”

He chides himself for thinking her interest in his sex life would have been anything but clinical. It’s embarrassing that he didn’t give her that credit.

“Sorry, it’s just that it’s been…not very private, the way that it happened. I’m kind of still on edge about it.”

She looks almost apologetic.

“Understandable.”

“He left two weeks ago for Munich. Um, I haven’t been with anyone since and…” He fights the nervous laugh trying to bubble up out of his throat. “And it was pretty—you know, it didn’t…wasn’t uncomfortable or anything. We were safe about it, so.”

Ratner, because she’s a veritable saint, just nods nonjudgmentally at him. She scribbles something down.

“Two weeks ago was week five for physical therapy,” she notes, doing the math he wasn’t going to mention.

“Yeah, well. I didn’t tell Harris. It never came up.” When she just looks at him, he manages to add, “Okay, it did come up, but only because she was congratulating me on a _good haul_.”

He shakes his head. Ratner doesn’t laugh but her lip twitches, and she looks to be fighting a smile tooth and nail. She says, “Trust Tommy to suck out all the marrow.”

“That’s one way of putting it.”

She points her pen at him.

“Do you need anything from me before we finish up here?”

He considers the question sincerely before blurting out, “When can I go back to work?”

“When Harris signs off on your forms I’ll put down my signature, too.”

His shoulders slump in something like relief and dread combined. Her neutral expression tightens into something resembling concern but nothing too extreme or overbearing. Her worry is contained, reined in. She just sits patiently waiting for him to explain, so he does.

“I haven’t tried holding an instrument there yet.”

He rubs his hand over his left shoulder, the arm that had been in a sling for the first few weeks when he got out of the hospital. It’s the arm he uses to make chords over the fretboard of a guitar; the wrist he shakes to make his notes ring in vibrato; the shoulder he uses to hold his viola. The spot feels tender, but he suspects the pain is at least partially psychosomatic because physical therapy has been going much too well for it to be completely physical.

Harris has shown him how much stronger his arm has become since the shooting. She’s shown him the weight he can lift comfortably, and she’s shown him what his new limits are and how to push them without hurting himself.

Ratner catches his trepidation, and she doesn’t remark on it. She just says, “The first test is to try it for yourself. Bring it up with her today when you go in.”

He nods his head in agreement. He’ll have a few hours before he goes in to see Harris at the end of the work day. Their appointments always run late since he’s typically her last patient. This is the second day of three that he’ll have to see her this week and hopefully—not to knock Harris or anything—will be among their last.

Ratner tells him to call if he needs to schedule another appointment for any reason and to call even if it’s just a question that doesn’t merit a visit. She reminds him as they’re walking out that he’s coming up on his last prescription refill and to let her know if the pain comes back once he’s been cut off. He’s been off the Percocet for months now, and the non-narcotic medication they’ve been prescribing has been holding him over fine, so he doesn’t take offense at the suggestion that he might not be ready to be weaned completely.

He’s sensitive about addiction talk only because he knows how readily people assume he would submit to its thrall. There’s never been anything in his personal history to suggest that he actually would, and Ratner has been careful to never hazard a guess in either direction.

She has always been a professional.

Will drives home irritatingly aware of his shoulder and the dull ache there that he’s now certain is the work of his brain rather than his skin and muscles. He takes the shortest route home, music playing softly on the radio and the warm August breeze filtering in through the open windows. His nearest neighbors up the road, the Dawsons, are out on their front yard when he drives by.

Vanessa looks up from the flower bed she’s been tending since the snow melted in March. Will waves and gets a smile from Vanessa and a nod from her husband, Kirk. They both wave back, all of Vanessa’s fingers caked in mud.

Abigail is also outside when he drives up to the house. She is seated on a chair Will sits in when the nights are warm and he can’t sleep. She is also wearing her boots to combat the mud left over from the infrequent cloudbursts they’ve been having lately. The porch is fairly dry, but the same can’t be said of the ground beyond the floorboards.

Her feet are up on the rail mounting the support beams, and five of the dogs have taken up watch around her. Simon, the Burmese Mountain dog, and Fenris, the Akbash, are curled up around the rocking chair. Winston, Madeline, and Penelope are scattered around the yard laying down or pawing at the rain-soaked earth. She stands when he gets out of the car and hops down from the porch to meet him before he can walk up the drive.

“Your phone’s off,” she says, shoving her hands in her back pockets and rocking a little on her heels.

He pats his jacket pocket where the device is tucked away and like she said, powered down. He leans against the door of his Crown Victoria and fiddles it back on so he won’t forget to do as much later. Fenris sniffs at him and Winston waits for his turn. Will ruffles his hand over both their heads.

While his hands and eyes are occupied she mumbles, “I had a favor to ask.”

“Oh?”

He drops his phone back into his pocket and gives her his full attention. She looks nervous.

“Yeah, I wanted to go by the garage,” she state haltingly. He battles the urge to reach out and touch her arm; he doesn’t want to risk interruption. “The lawyers said the car is still technically mine, if I want it, and I’ve just been thinking, well, since you’re going to be through with PT soon and going back to work, I don’t want to be here by myself all day doing nothing, as much as I love your dogs.”

He watches her and keeps his expression blank but soft.

She swallows and says, “I’ve been looking for something in town.”

He feels a cold fear build up instantaneously in his gut. He hazards a guess, hoping it’s the right one: “You want to get a job?”

Abigail nods her head yes. She continues, “Nothing big. It’s not like we ever want for anything.”

He suspects she’s explaining because she’s followed his train of thought and doesn’t want to give him the impression that she’s saving up to move out, not that he would stop her if she chose to do just that. He would be thrilled for her and supportive if she sought to have that independence for herself. In the same vein, his definition of independence has shifted a great deal since she came into his life.

“I don’t like using the money from…the savings account.” She turns slowly and he walks with her around the side of the house. They start walking further toward the higher grass where the yard peters out and the land begins. “And if I earn my own money I can start building a more impressive collection of art stuff.”

“Art stuff,” he repeats in a jesting, snooty voice.

She matches it exactly: “Art stuff.”

They laugh a little bit, Will mostly enjoying the stroll and the weather and Abigail’s return to ease at his side. In his normal voice he asks, “What have you been looking at?”

“Oh, coffee houses; book stores and the like.” She hums and shrugs, eyes looking out over the trees in the distance. “My mom had a lot of friends who were shopkeepers. It was almost like she collected them.”

“You think one of them might have something?”

“I don’t know. It would make the whole job hunting thing a lot easier, but then I’d have to deal with them knowing all about my parents and what happened.”

She sounds a lot lighter than she ever has when discussing this with him before. He starts to question why that might be when she continues, “Marissa said she could talk to her boss at the CD store she works. They’re pretty good friends; she’s been working there for two years now.”

“Very _Pretty in Pink_ ,” he muses. “I like it.”

With a sly smile Abigail says, “She prefers _High Fidelity._ ”

“Well, of course,” he yields. “John Cusack.” She gives him a confused glance, and he frowns at his apparent age, explaining, “ _Say Anything…?_ ”

He throws his hands dismissively when she just continues to look at him like he’s grown a second nose on his face. At least he’s rewarded for his troubles with a grin the likes of which puts wrinkles around the corners of her eyes. He lets himself smile, too, and bends down to snap off a long stalk of green vegetation and deposits it in the corner of his mouth.

They walk a ways longer before eventually rounding back for the house. He’s properly chewed on the gritty end between his teeth when she bumps his arm gently with her elbow.

“You’re okay with this?”

“Yeah,” he says, meaning it and hoping to the powers that be that she can tell he does. “Maybe life’ll start to feel normal again.”

A soft look comes across her face, and he knows it’s because life won’t feel normal for them for a very long time, if it ever does. They both know it’s not a loaded statement but one given from calm intent and heartfelt support. She doesn’t call him on it. She just watches him for a few seconds longer before smiling faintly to herself and taking a deep breath in and out.

“How about I drop you off at the garage on the way to PT?”

She nods yes and goes with him into the house. While he was out she threw together a dish she tells him she can’t pronounce but that her mother always told her was German. It has thick cuts of fried potatoes, generous helpings of chopped ham, and bell peppers tossed into scrambled eggs. He pours two glasses of orange juice, store bought, and sits down with Abigail to eat.

It occurs to him that she cooks for them a lot more than he does. When he checks the text on his phone she doesn’t make a comment about manners or dinner table etiquette. She does scoff at the besotted look he probably gets on his face when he sees the message is from Hannibal.

_About to go on. The people here are very loud._

Will bites his lip and types back, _It’s probably just really hot in the audience._

Hannibal’s retort is almost immediate. He says, _You and Abel._

He imagines Hannibal shaking his head at Will and bites back his pleased snickering.

_He doesn’t cater to your ego either?_

“Where’d the tour take them this week?”

“Oberhausen,” Will replies easily, knowing that that’s where Hannibal is playing tonight. He thinks back to the band’s official website that listed the venue as a place called Turbinenhalle. “Before that it was Bremen, Berlin, and…Offenbach.”

“They made a stop in Milan, right?” He looks up at her from the rim of his glass. “I looked online, too.”

Of course she did.

“Yes, Milan, too,” he confirms, strategically not telling her about the gorgeous brush set Hannibal bought her from a place called L'Eliografica. “He sent pictures.”

“He comes with perks,” she observes with a teasing smile on her face.

“He really does,” Will murmurs, opening the text that finally comes in from Hannibal.

It reads, _He would if he were my boyfriend._

Will calmly sets his phone down, clunks his elbows on the table, and lets his head fall into his hands.

“What’s so funny?”

Abigail’s peering at him from over a forkful of scrambled eggs and ham. He realizes his shoulders are shaking and that he’s laughing.

“My boyfriend,” he chuckles, loving the way the word feels with the picture of Hannibal behind it, “is…”

He shows Abigail the texts, not really having a word in mind to describe _what_ Hannibal is. Abigail laughs, and he thinks the airy sound of it comes close.

Fondly she murmurs, “Oh, no, he’s corny.”

He battles the urge to type what Abigail called him.

_Alas you’re stuck with me._

He tucks his phone into his pocket, satisfied, and finishes up his plate. Abigail reluctantly leaves the dishes with him to go throw the Frisbee with the dogs outside. The kitchen predominantly cleaned, he heads to his room and fumbles a dusty case out of the closet. Will sets it on the floor and swipes his hand across the smooth, deep brown shell of the case before clicking the latch open and revealing the polished wooden instrument in its soft pearl interior.

Will lifts the viola out of its case and fiddles the shoulder rest onto the curved edge along the bottom of the instrument’s body before carrying it and the bow to the bed. His legs feel shaky, so he sits to tune the strings that have been out of use all this time that he’s kept the viola locked up in his closet like a skeleton. He pries his phone out of his pocket with trembling fingers when it buzzes insistently against his leg.

Hannibal sent him a photo of a large crowd screaming and waving their arms at the camera. There’s a pretty, young woman toward the front with bright red hair staring dreamily just over the focus of the camera. He rolls his eyes, the fluttering in his chest easing and quieting down.

Beneath the photo is Hannibal’s text: _Yes I’m a very lucky man_

Will smiles and tosses his phone onto a pillow, twisting his wrist so the viola arcs through the air and lands on his shoulder, still sensitive but probably more from nerves than from anything else.

He plucks a few notes for a while, sticking strictly to pizzicato while warming up his hands and getting his shoulder used to the small pressure of the rest mounted there between him and the instrument. Will shifts from first position to second and plays around from there, strumming his middle finger through random chords before picking a more defined rhythm to follow. It’s as he’s dragging his fingers across a D minor seventh that he snaps and recognizes the song his hands lead him into; recognizes it from the key it bears in common with the one Hannibal sang to him the last night they were together.

The bow is dry when he presses it against the strings. He stands and retrieves the tiny cake of rosin from the case. It leaves the sticky trace of Greek pitch up and down the hairs that will make the strands catch and the strings speak. At first the stick fits awkwardly between his fingers. He fusses with the frog, pinching it between the fingers of one hand as he twists the screw with the other to tighten the bow hair. The viola remains propped up on his shoulder.

Will tests his right hand with a series of long pulls on the bow. The sound is stuttered for a few beats before he steadies his arm and draws the bow across the strings more confidently.

That he’s out of practice shows in his initial perusal of the G minor melodic scale, but he straightens his back and relaxes into a comfortable, familiar posture with the viola held out and to the left. There’s a small but sharp twisting sensation right around the vicinity of his collar bone near the old gunshot wound. He breathes a slow breath out through his mouth and closes his eyes, ignoring the bite that feels like fire. He plays the song he’d found before.

Granted, it takes a moment for him to find the notes. It only sounds like experimentation at first, but slowly, it begins to sound like music. Even then it’s hardly recognizable and takes a few foul notes to sound like Georgia On My Mind the way Ray Charles plays it.

Once Will gets to a place where he can hear the melody without keeping it suspended on the strings, he branches off into an improvised solo up and down the C scale. He experiments with the different octaves he can pick out from what he knows the chord progressions sound like on the recording, leaning when a note demands to be sustained and sighing when he finds himself shifting into the dominant seventh scale and making a home in the Mixolydian mode.

Will feels himself in the music; feels himself drifting through it like a leaf carried on the wind. The song’s become light like smoke unwinding and climbing up a winter sky painted navy along the horizon; whimsical like a kite bobbing at the end of a string tethering it to a terrestrial plane.

His eyes drift open and he jerks at Abigail’s shadow darkening the hallway just outside his room. Her eyes are on the viola that she didn’t know he played. She says as much once she stops blinking at his hands when he sets the instrument on his lap.

“I didn’t know you played,” she murmurs softly, hovering in the doorway.

“Wasn’t sure I still could,” he confesses, twisting the screw to undo the tension stretching the hairs. “It’s been a while.”

“Six months?”

“Creeping up on seven now.”

She nods and waits for him to return the ruddy wooden instrument and the components that comprise it to the case left open on the floor. Will crouches to do up the buckles and tucks it back into the closet, turning to find Abigail sitting at the foot of his bed with her legs crossed beneath her. She’s giving him an expectant look. He waits, uncertain as to what he’s supposed to say.

“You play beautifully.”

“Thank you.”

Her face remains impassive for a few seconds longer before breaking into a grin.

“Why haven’t you played _before?_ ”

She looks young when she does this, when she puts him on the spot. She’s really done it for as long as he’s known her; the very first time they met when Zeller was still her teacher, she asked him a dozen questions about the clarinet he brought with him, what type of music he meant to teach his new student, and just how long he had been playing that particular clarinet because she played the clarinet, too, wow, what a small world.

If she ended up not being an artist or a musician or a record store manager, Abigail could probably work with people. He shudders to think about politics, but she’s crafty enough when she deigns to be, so he doesn’t completely disregard that career choice either.

Abigail can still be whatever she makes up her mind to be. He’ll never tell her anything different.

“It hasn’t really been at the forefront of my concentration.”

“The forefront of your concentration,” she echoes, using that mock-snooty voice they had joked around with earlier.

“That’s what I said.”

“Well, I don’t see how that is, the way you play.” He thinks he must furrow his eyebrows at her or frown because she makes a face at him and says, “You know how when I first started to paint, all that stuff you said about…”

She looks at the floor as if she can’t remember specific phrases from his constant rants about her talent and catharsis and creative outlets, and maybe she can’t, but they’re lodged deep in his memory and he can never forget. He had made a bit of a fool of himself at the time, but he had been passionate about her natural grace with a paintbrush and he had been crazy at her apparent indifference to it.

Will must make another telling face because she smiles up at him without saying another word about it. He opens and closes his mouth, not unlike a fish, and sits down near the pillows.

“How long were you standing there?”

Abigail purses her lips and mumbles, “A few minutes. You were really into it.” She leans forward to reach Simon’s ears. Apparently a handful of the dogs had gathered while he was playing and he didn’t notice them either. “What was that song?”

“Well, it _was_ Georgia On My Mind,” he starts, honestly doubtful that his playing sounded anything like the original piece towards the end. “I guess I got carried away.”

“It was cool,” she remarks, sounding farther off than she is. It’s a casual statement the way her voice moseys the words into being. She sounds almost sleepy. “Felt kind of like…being under a waterfall.” She straightens out, Simon looking less than thrilled about the loss of her hands on his ears. “Sort of muffling, you know?”

“I do.”

He nods and looks at a spot on the wall behind her, avoiding her eyes because she’s avoiding his.

“Will you play again sometime?”

Warmth spills over in the center of his chest. The phantom ache that clenched in him earlier lifted sometime while he was playing, he’s glad to discover.

“Sure.”

They wander around the house for a while after that, aimless and separate but really connected in a hypersensitive kind of way. Will, for his part, usually can’t help but be aware of other people—except, obviously, when he’s too aware of music to notice anything outside of it.

Abigail switches between fiddling with a canvas half painted in greens and yellows and practicing chord progressions on the piano in the den. Will mainly tidies up around the house so that Abigail won’t feel compelled to do it while he’s preoccupied with PT. He asks if she’s going to take the car anywhere. She tells him maybe she’ll stop by in town if Marissa’s working or head back up to the craft store for more _art stuff._

She calls the garage in Fairfax to make sure it’s okay to go get the Civic later, and Will checks his phone for calls or messages he might have missed while he was playing. Alana texted him and he never replied to Hannibal’s earlier text, but he figures Hannibal won’t have his hands free for the next few hours anyway what with the show going on in Oberhausen.

Alana’s text bids him good luck at PT, a sentiment she doles out sparingly, knowing it will start to wear out if she says it too many times. He appreciates it anyway and types back a thank you, lingering a while over her contact entry and considering what the least awkward way to ask her to lunch would be. Alana sends him another text, saving him from himself like the angel she so often proves herself to be.

_Think you’ll be good to have lunch next Tuesday?_

Tuesday is a very safe, calculated suggestion. He normally has PT scheduled Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and Alana knows he’s nearing the end of it. She’s probably thinking that he’ll definitely have to be finished by the time Tuesday rolls around, and he really, really hopes that’s the case because it’ll be a depressing luncheon otherwise.

But Alana is good and kind and considerate, and she’ll know ahead of time whether he’s graduated out or hasn’t met Harris’ expectations just yet. She’ll conduct herself accordingly no matter what the circumstances end up being.

_That sounds great._

He only just refrains from sending her a smiley face or something equally docile to show her he’s actually looking forward to it and not just resigning himself to a social outing with a colleague. He doesn’t want her oozing concern at him, but that’s all the more reason to be _done_ with physical therapy by Tuesday. In the end he just leaves the message as is and heaves a sigh of relief when she texts him back, sounding genuine and eager enough to meet with him.

When the hour ticks by for them to go, he drives the twenty minutes to Fairfax. He hangs around nearby to make sure she gets the car without too much friction and waits a while longer after they bring it out for her to take.

The engine runs okay. The dark turquoise paint glints in the sun and catches shadows and reflections as clearly as glass does. He bends at the waist to give her a nod of encouragement. Something about seeing her behind the wheel of this car that is both new and old to both of them feels promising and hopeful.

He’s also scared as hell because it means she could leave him someday; it means that she _will_ leave, someday. Instead of letting himself live in that fear of an inevitable separation—because Abigail is an _adult_ and because he is, _too_ —he just smiles and decides to live in that vast, exhilarating optimism that stands on the other side of fear.

She smiles back at him, reassured by whatever it is his smile tells her about this moment, about him, about anything, and nods once, waiting for him to step back before turning the car around and driving out of the lot. He waits a moment with his hands in his pockets, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.

“They grow up fast, don’t they?”

Will starts and whirls around. There’s a man in a clean white jumpsuit wiping down the hood of a faded blue Mustang Fastback and giving Will a significant look.

“Oh, she’s…” He considers saying she’s not his daughter, but then he might just look like a weird old guy pining for a young girl, which he adamantly tells himself he is not. He shakes his head to himself and mumbles, “Yeah, they’ll make your head spin.”

The man, white hair balding and much older than Will but still robust and straight-backed, just nods and smiles like he can see through Will’s dry retort and decipher the truth. He says nothing else and goes back to polishing the shiny hood of the car. Will gets back in his Crown Victoria and drives off, not in any particular hurry to get to Alliance for PT but not wanting to dawdle in any case.

It’s a short drive from the garage, so he just heads over and parks the car to text Abigail. It pretty much goes without saying that he’ll want to hear from her when she gets back to the house safe and sound, but he sends a message her way all the same. He figures it’s better to let her know he wants her to check in than to just expect her to do it.

He also got an email from Hannibal while he was making the drive to GMU Rappahannock. He checks the message and finds an audio file attached. Will downloads it and ruminates on the disappearing, reappearing pain in his shoulder while he waits. It’s half past five when he opens the file, so it’ll be nearing eleven o’ clock in Oberhausen by now.

At first all he hears is screaming and he rolls his eyes at the way the noise causes the static to crackle in the phone’s speakers, but then he hears music keying in and starting as the crowd’s excitement dies down. Will waits for words but what he gets instead is guitar, one strummed chord and then another, leading into a gorgeous saxophone lick that can only be Hannibal.

He hears a keyboard playing along and imagines the focused scowl on Abel Gideon’s face as he takes his hands up and down the keys, exaggerating his bounds a few times when the part obviously calls for him to play mere chords. His improvisations don’t even touch what Hannibal’s doing for his part, dipping up and down octaves and making the saxophone scream for him in the most beautiful way. Will closes his eyes and rests his head back against the seat, listening and sinking into the brilliantly sultry riffs screeching under the reed pressed beneath Hannibal’s tongue.

It’s halfway through when the crowd starts cheering at a complicated run he plays that Will jolts, realization setting in that he’s found himself listening again to Ray Charles. He flounders and clutches the phone more tightly to his chest as he lets the music back into him.

Across the Northern half of the Atlantic Ocean, thousands of miles away, Hannibal had played this song for him just like Will played it in his bedroom, alone on his viola. He orchestrated a _performance_ , and Nemean Lion _went along_ with it. He hopes he’ll get to tell them someday how much it means to him that they did. He hopes he’ll find it in himself to articulate to Hannibal that they’d been doing the same thing at different times of the day.

When the song comes to a close on the jubilant high note, Hannibal holds it and then finishes in a crescendo with the band perfectly in synch with him. The audience absolutely roars, which Will deems fitting considering the band’s namesake is a lion.

Just barely Will can hear Hannibal over the screams. He says, “Für meinen Schatz.” 

The women become hysterical; it’s really the only word to describe the whistling and hollering. Well, Will says women, but there’s really no way to tell who all from the crowd is contributing to the noise threatening to bust the speakers on Hannibal’s phone. He hears someone snorting on the microphone as the applause dies down.

Don’s voice says, “Er ist hoffnunglos verloren.”

There’s laughter, and it sounds carefree and open and revelrous. The recording stops and vaults the car into silence.

Will breathes around the quiet, around the steady but quickened beat of his heart. The phone is still clutched to his chest and his eyes are still pinched shut. A heady current of something in between static heat and empty velocity deluges him and spins mercilessly at the very core of him. He taps the blade of his hand dully on the steering wheel and laughs softly, skeptically, _happily._

 _That’s what it is, isn’t it,_ he thinks around a tight-lipped smile that he feels in the center of his chest like wind being knocked out of him. _Happiness._

It’s happiness.

That’s what it is because Hannibal makes him happy, and for some reason the idea is crazier to Will than the recording he just heard. He starts to pull himself together when he gets a text from Abigail saying she stopped to see Marissa and she’ll be home in time to make dinner. He starts to feebly protest, but she beats him to the draw.

_Don’t even think about it, Marissa’s coming over and we’re making lasagna._

He waits, tapping his finger on the side of the cell phone.

_Can Marissa come over?_

A damn elegant chortle tumbles from his lips and he tells her yes. Bolstered by Abigail’s intervention and urged on by the time on the clock, Will gets out of the car and makes for the Clinic. There are words and emotions on the tips of his fingers waiting and itching for a proper chance to communicate with Hannibal beyond music and beyond shared daydreams.

When he goes to see Harris she teases him about the flush in his cheeks, matronly and getting on in her years but excellent at what she does. She’s also a veritable expert in all the ways Will’s arm will and won’t move, which is both fascinating and sort of weird.

He’s in such a good mood already that he barely even snaps when she signs off on his form and tells him he’s done.

Harris, small blue eyes all-seeing, smiles at him and pats his cheek on his way out. In the sweet, motherly voice she often used when correcting his posture if she caught him slouching, she tells him, “And don’t let me catch you around here again, Will Graham.”

He surprises them both by laughing, really laughing, loudly, and making something of a scene in the middle of the spacious lobby. Since he’s been in this place he’s never laughed, not once.

For a minute he worries she might try to hug him, but she merely touches his arm once and waits for him to be ready to leave. As he’s making up his mind to turn and go like he knows he needs to, he hears her say, “Best of luck to you, Will.”

“Thanks, Tommy.”

He smiles and goes, and he’s _done._ He’s _free._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bauernfruhstuck (German Farmer’s Breakfast)  
> http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/german_farmers_breakfast/
> 
> Viola case based on designs by Dimitri Musafia  
> http://www.musafia.com/spotlight4.html
> 
> Saxy interpretation of Georgia On My Mind  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqXkcPH4teo
> 
> “Sometimes, I felt like we were doing the same things at different times of day” from Bryan Fuller’s Hannibal (S1E4: Oeuf)
> 
> Für meinen Schatz > To my sweetheart.  
> Er ist hoffnunglos verloren. > He’s completely hopeless.
> 
> *Thank you, Salyiha, you beautiful. :)


	12. Keys to Your Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys work with a six hour time difference.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _You know, baby, I put a spell on you/Can’t take it off now, there ain’t nothing you can do/I’ve got the keys to your love/I play the keys of your heart/It sounds so sweet, baby/Won’t stop once I start_

_“You must be Will Graham,” Louise Hobbs says, shaking his hand and smiling. “Abigail said you’d be coming by today.”_

_He ducks his head and replies, “Yeah, she said she wasn’t going to have a ride this week, so I thought this would be a good compromise—better than skipping altogether, I mean.”_

_“What a find,” a voice floats to the hall from another room farther back into the house. A man steps out of the kitchen, folding a dish towel into fourths. He extends his hand and continues, looking not at his wife but at Will, “Someone just as fastidious as our girl, right, Lou?”_

_“Mr. Hobbs,” Will names him._

_“Ah, just Garrett when you’re in my house, Mr. Graham.”_

_The man winks. He doesn’t give Will a chance to tell him he can use his first name, too, if he prefers._

_“Abigail’s in her room; down the hall, last one on the left.”_

_Will turns to thank him and there are seven red founts trickling through the bloodstained material of the man’s shirt. There’s blood frothing out of his mouth. He muses, smiling, “You think you’re her father now? You think you get to take her away from me, Mr. Graham? You think I won’t drag you down here with me?”_

_He reaches forward and presses his hand just beneath Will’s collar bone, over his racing heartbeat. His flesh bursts beneath the man’s bloodied palm, and he’s falling. He’s falling through the floor, through the earth, through darkness. He falls and falls, and the blood continues to flow._

Will jerks out of his sleep, drenched and shivering and breathing erratically. He lurches out of bed and falls into a sitting position on the floor. He waits a moment, gauging the silence around his labored panting. Specifically he listens for a sign that Abigail may have woken, but he only gets Winston, sniffing at his knee with as much concern as he ever has for his wellbeing. He pats his head a while and calms down, cherishing the quiet state of the house, especially since Marissa stayed over after dinner the night before.

He looks up over the bed. The time on the clock reads a quarter to three in the morning.

The price for the welcome distance from his dreams is sleep. He’s never been a stranger to insomnia, so he’s resigned to it, really.

_Distance._

Six hours added to his two makes it eight forty five in Oberhausen. He tugs off his shirt, flings it at the corner near the dirty clothes’ hamper, and climbs up to sit on the edge of the bed with his head in his hands.

“He’d want you to call,” he mumbles to himself. “There doesn’t have to be anything wrong for you to call him.”

Will takes a few more moments to snap all the way awake and brush off the last tendrils of shadow left over from his dream. His fingers twitch for his cell phone on the bedside table, decision half made already. He’ll have to explain the late hour, but maybe Hannibal won’t need an explanation. Will blearily reaches for the device, flips through his contacts, and hesitates over the call button. He decides sending a text would be better, less obtrusive. It also reduces the risk of waking Hannibal in case he’s still asleep.

He tries a few different openings before he gives up and sends, _I’ve got Georgia on my mind._

Prepared to wait anywhere from a few minutes to an hour, Will lays flat on the bed with his feet firmly on the floor. He imagines the crowd from the photo Hannibal sent him alive and raving on the ceiling. He pictures himself off to one side, looking on from behind a curtain while faceless members of the sound crew move around him. He closes his eyes and conjures an image he tucked away in his memory the first time he laid eyes on Nemean Lion at La Fin Absolue du Monde.

He imagines Don shouting passionately into a microphone and shaking his hips in Abel’s direction just to watch him frown disapprovingly from his spot behind the keyboard. Bedelia would be off with her drums, paying the men no mind, and Bryn, the band’s tall, brunette bassist would be near the front of the stage with her head down in concentration. Hannibal would be standing at Don’s right hand, playing the hell out of his saxophone and making the fans howl in gratification.

He’d turn and give Will one of those half smirks he does so well through the stage lights, and Will would sag slightly against the wall in a near swoon over that smile that he’d done nothing to earn.

His eyes fall open when his phone buzzes in his hand. He blinks a few times and checks the message.

_Will it’s 3 in the morning._

_Yes it is,_ he types back after noting the time on the phone that reads three fifteen. _I couldn’t sleep._

Disregarding the snooze he just slipped into, it’s technically not a lie. He doesn’t _want_ to sleep, but he doesn’t really care to share that much with Hannibal.

Hannibal asks him, _Were you having a nightmare?_

Will stares at the message and eventually replies, _It’s one I’ve had before._

He sends another one that says, _Nothing new_

Hannibal is a long time in texting back, but about ten minutes later with Will nodding off again, he says, _Can I call you?_

Will swallows once and calls him.

“Will,” Hannibal says at once, in that deep, lovely voice tinged with an accent Will couldn’t replicate if he tried.

“Hi.” He knows he probably sounds foggy at best. He _did_ just wake up for the second, almost third, time tonight. “I’m okay. I just wanted—” _to hear your voice_ “—to talk to you.”

He can detect something like uncertainty in Hannibal’s voice when he asks, “Was the recording too much?”

“What?” Will blinks, remembering he hasn’t yet given said recording a proper response. “No! No, it…I loved it. It was perfect, thank you.” He laughs a little under his breath and adds, “I’m surprised the rest of the band let you do it.”

Hannibal chuckles, a low, warm sound.

“Donald will never let me live it down,” he concedes. “Bryn cooed, and Bedelia smirked. Abel mostly frowned.”

Will laughs and then checks himself, fretting over volume. He pushes himself to sit upright and holds the phone securely to his ear with his head down.

“What was it he said to you after?”

He’s not fluent in German, but he could guess well enough at what Hannibal had said. His cheeks flush slightly at the thought, but he holds his tongue, waiting for Hannibal’s translation.

“He said I was hopeless.”

Will’s smile widens, almost deliriously. He murmurs, “I’m so happy.”

He stops, questioning whether it’s a step too far to say something so brash. It isn’t much of a decision, really; he’s sleepy and Hannibal’s the one making him happy anyway, so Will figures he ought to know. When Hannibal doesn’t say anything right away, Will just leans to one side and flops back down face first into his pillow. He wiggles a bit until he’s on the dry half of the sheets and holds the phone over his ear.

There’s a sound of shuffling on the other line and Hannibal finally tells him, “Yes, I am as well.”

He suspects Hannibal’s surprised at how easy Will is when he’s got one foot in his dreams and one buried under the blankets. His surmisal is proven correct when Hannibal states, with some—frankly, very cute—diplomacy in his tone, “Perhaps you’d like to call me once you’ve had an adequate amount of sleep.”

“I’ll have more bad dreams.”

He drifts in the quiet spaces between his and Hannibal’s words, but he never quite allows himself to slip underneath.

“Do you often have bad dreams?”

Will sighs, “Yes.”

He’s ready to tell Hannibal all about Garrett Jacob Hobbs and the pressures of being not a father but at the very least a paternal figure and how bad it was getting shot and shooting Hobbs even though he had to, but Hannibal doesn’t ask him what his nightmares are about. Hannibal just shuffles wordlessly about; a door opens and closes, and Will can make out the soft, fleshy stick of bare feet on hard flooring beneath the faint trickle of static. He hears a knock and then another door opening after a drawn out pause.

Don’s voice croaks out, “Damn it, Hannibal, what’d I say about knocking on my door before noon?”

“Let me borrow your guitar.”

Both of their voices are quieter, like Hannibal might be holding the phone off to the side while he and Don talk. He imagines the man scrubbing a hand down his face and ruffling his hair as he groans in defeat and dejectedly slurs, “One guitar coming up.”

Will turns over onto his back and listens to the silence that is Hannibal’s presence on the other line. The previous times they conversed on the phone it had been much later in Hannibal’s time zone, but now Will envisions a brilliant hallway illuminated in golden sunlight; he paints a vivid green and blue exterior for the unseen German landscape outside. The door squeaks opens again.

“Not the electric, Donald,” Hannibal huffs. Will snorts at his tone.

“Well, Jesus, I just woke up. Give me a chance.”

“The nylon if you have it.”

There’s a pause.

“There are like five guitars in here, genius. You might have said that the first time.”

The door closes again. Will grins behind his hand. The door opens again.

“Here, man.”

He can hear the soft hum of strings pressing against skin when Hannibal takes the guitar in his hand.

“Thank you. I apologize for waking you.”

“You’ll do it at least a dozen more times before we get to Birmingham. It’s one of the many perks of being in a band with you.” Don maybe waves his hand noncommittally and says, with more interest and sounding much more alert, “Hey, is that your _lover?_ ”

The word rolls off Don’s tongue obscenely and causes Will to turn and muffle his laugh in the pillow. He thinks Don might be the type of person to wag his eyebrows for emphasis. The mental image makes him scrunch his nose as he’s smiling.

Don laughs, “What _time_ is it in Virginia?”

“Good morning, _Donald._ ”

“Good morning, Will,” Don sings.

Will hears him whistling something that sounds a lot like _K-I-S-S-I-N-G_ as Hannibal walks back to his room. That he can’t actually kiss Hannibal under the circumstances is the only reason he dislikes the gesture.

_Obviously, Don,_ he thinks, more than a little petulantly.

Another door opens and closes. Will says, still chuckling, “At this rate I’ll have met them all before you get home.”

“They’ll insist on something official and humiliating,” Hannibal assures him offhandedly. “They’ll _insist._ ”

Will doesn’t doubt Beverly, Price, and Zeller will jump at the same opportunity once Hannibal comes back. He hums and shifts his shoulders against the sheets. He hears fabric rustling on Hannibal’s side and then strings tuning.

He tells Hannibal, “It’s in the job description.”

“I suppose it is,” Hannibal murmurs, lightly strumming a chord down the strings. He clears his throat. “There’s a song I’ve been learning. I thought I would play it to you one night before bed, but our schedules haven’t intersected this favorably since I first departed for Munich. Would you mind hearing it now, while we have the opportunity?”

“Carpe diem,” Will replies sleepily.

“Retention of Latin, even in exhaustion; impressive,” Hannibal muses, picking a melody from a chord.

“Everyone knows carpe diem,” he objects weakly around a yawn.

“You are modest almost to a fault, Will.” Hannibal tuts and adds, morosely, “I love to compliment you.”

Will’s face warms, that same heat expanding in his belly. He blinks a few times up at the ceiling and turns onto his side. Sleep still tugs at him, but it isn’t as urgent as it was just a few seconds ago. He considers stammering out his chagrined thanks, but Hannibal is playing those same notes from earlier with deliberation. He picks around a chord, the song commencing in fingerstyle. The nylon strings carry music softly, as if they were muted but still capable of reverberation.

The notes stop for a moment and more fabric rustles as Hannibal resituates himself. He says, Will thinks self-consciously, “It was Bryn’s enthusiastic recommendation that I play it for you.”

He pillows his hand under his head and mumbles, “Okay.”

Hannibal’s fingers work at the same time that he sings in a soft voice, “I can only give you love that lasts forever and a promise to be near each time you call.” The notes beneath are slow and patient like a caress of fingertips across receptive skin. Hannibal continues, “And the only heart I own, for you and you alone; that’s all. That’s all.

“I can only give you country walks in springtime and a hand to hold when leaves begin to fall and a love whose burning light will warm the winter night; that’s all. That’s all.”

Every other note matches the pitch and gentility of Hannibal’s voice, just barely louder than a murmur. The undercurrent of the bass line calls and answers to the melody on the higher strings; it mirrors the ebb and flow of the tide beneath a magnetic moon. It lulls and brushes and soothes.

“There are those, I am sure, who have told you they would give you the world for a toy. All I have are these arms to enfold you and a love time can never destroy.” Again the bass notes fill the spaces in between the lyrics. “If you’re wondering what I’m asking in return, dear, you’ll be glad to know that my demands are small.”

His fingers begin to linger, paying heed to a ritardando in the last few measures of the song. Each fragment of ringing music is a press of lips on Will’s face, on his heavy eyelids, and near his mouth. It sings inside of him as solidly and undetectably as the blood pulsing through his veins, thoughts firing through synapses, or lungs ballooning with oxygen.

“Say it’s me that you’ll adore, for now and ever more; that’s all. That’s all.”

An unhurried lick follows the words, and the music tapers off. The final notes hang in the air and gradually fade until Hannibal presses his hand gently to the strings and cuts off the sound completely. They sit in silence, Will blinking and his insides humming and his mouth open around the uneven drag and release of breath.

“Remind me later to…” Will rubs his fingers into his temples. He sinks his teeth into his lip and sighs. “Remind me to tell Bryn…”

“Yes?”

“Um…” Will laughs shakily and stammers out, “I love Nat King Cole.” He does love Nat King Cole; he would have to be crazy not to love Nat King Cole. “I love,” he pauses, trying to be emphatic when he adds, “his music, the lyrics.”

In a small voice, Hannibal asks, “Do you?”

“Yeah.” He nods against his hand, burying his face in the pillow. “They’re beautiful. They’re always beautiful.”

“I’m very happy you liked it.” Hannibal’s voice is warm and quiet, and if he could, Will would wrap Hannibal up in his limbs and show him just how much he liked it. He says, in the formal tone of an officiator, “Bryn will be pleased to know you did.”

“I’m sure she will be.” There’s more rustling of sheets and the faint hollow ring of Hannibal setting the guitar down on the floor. “Hannibal?”

“Will?”

He has a flash of himself as a teenager, waiting up late on the phone for a call just like this; waiting up to talk all night about the simultaneous hunger and trembling pain deep inside him making him feel hollow and whole at the same time; waiting up to confess to yearning and to happiness.

He had already confessed to happiness. To himself he had admitted to yearning.

“I…” Will closes his eyes. “Thank you.”

Hannibal hums. He says, “Does this still feel too fast for you?”

“No, it feels right.”

Will knows Hannibal asks at all because Will was the one to say things between them felt rushed, but he doesn’t like the way the question sounds. He doesn’t like that Hannibal may have thought he was at fault because the suddenness of their relationship never bothered him.

It isn’t fair for Hannibal to worry about something that only ever existed in Will’s mind, so he goes on in bursts: “When we met, my life was at a standstill. I wasn’t looking for this—what we have now. Finding you, realizing that I hadn’t been living since Hobbs, it took me by surprise. And then,” Will adds, laughing, “you ended up being…so wonderful, and I don’t…I wasn’t ready, for any of it.”

Everything goes very quiet on Hannibal’s end, so Will bites his lip and ruminates on what he’s said. He racks his brain for anything else he can tell Hannibal now that he has the floor and they both want to listen and be heard.

He says, “In a way I think this separation has been good, not because I don’t want to see you—I do, God, every day—but because we spent so much time together at the start. We met and then we were at your house and then there was your uncle and your sister, and we did that stuff with the rope, oh, my _God_ , the stuff with the rope.” He pauses for Hannibal’s tiny chuckle. “And we learned all these things about each other in this unbelievable window of time and your sister was wonderful and Abigail loved her. She’s even painting now, and—and you played Georgia in front of a huge crowd in another country and they loved it.”

Will notices he’s blinking rapidly around moisture gathering in his eyes and promptly sits up. He looks straight up at the ceiling and shakes his head to himself.

“Everything about knowing you and being with you is…it makes me crazy, Hannibal. And I mean that in the best way, not the way I did before when I said _this_ was crazy, which it still is, by the way. We’re insane.”

“Reason and love keep little company,” Hannibal says softly.

Will drops his head forward, recognizing the line, and replies, “Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful.”

And then his heart stutters in his chest.

“Reason and love,” he repeats, licking his lips.

“Reason and love, Will,” Hannibal murmurs. His voice lilts in such a way that Will can picture the soft smile on his face. “You obviously know the story of the four young Athenians lost and enamored in a magical wood.”

“A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” Will answers, nodding again. He makes a soft sound in the back of his throat, remembering when he read the play in high school and then again in college for his class on Shakespeare. He closes his eyes and recalls the vivid scenes he painted in his mind of that magical wood as he read. He thinks of bucolic trees and fireflies glowing in the darkness; their images are as solid in his memory as if they had been real. “I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again. Mine ear is much enamored of thy note; so is mine eye enthralled to thy shape.”

Hannibal completes the passage for him: “And thy fair virtue’s force perforce doth move me on the first view to say, to swear, I love thee.”

He’d done it often enough with music for it not to be a huge discovery on Will’s part, but to hear it, even in quoted from a Shakespearian sonnet, is quite the new experience. Will realizes, belatedly, that he basically said it back just as easily.

“Oh.”

“I was under the impression,” Hannibal starts, speaking slowly as if he expects Will might try to interrupt him, “that we were in agreement on this subject.”

_I think I needed as much as I could get from you since I saw you looking back at me through those stage lights. I feel drawn in by you, like I couldn’t go back if I wanted to._

Will whispers, “You feel the same way?”

Will hadn’t said the remembered words out loud, but Hannibal appears to have the same memory in mind because he says, “I, too, felt drawn in.”

He has every impulse to inform Hannibal as to how impossible that is, but he’s chastened by what Hannibal had said before about his modesty. Robertus had said something to that effect also, that it fooled no one. Will thinks maybe he meant that it fooled no one but Will because that’s about what it feels like.

Because he really can’t place what Hannibal could have seen in him from their first few hours together, he asks, “What did it?”

He expects a longsuffering sigh or tortured bemoaning of Will’s low self-esteem, but Hannibal merely remains silent, taking stock of his words before he lets Will hear them. He likes to think Hannibal doesn’t chide him for his propriety here because he can see that it’s not really an issue of his self-confidence or even a matter of doubt. It’s just that Will remembers the exact instant that it clicked in his mind that he was falling for this mysterious man of tattoos and music. He’s curious about whether there was a single moment for Hannibal and whether he would be willing to share it with Will.

“Do you recall dropping your beer during our set?”

“Yes,” Will answers straight away.

He had been so embarrassed at drawing attention to himself that he doubts he’ll ever forget it. Hannibal doesn’t say anything for a spell, and Will tilts his head to one side, considering.

“No.”

Hannibal chuckles at Will’s mortification. He says, “Yes, I’m afraid.” 

“Oh, my—but you…”

Hannibal finishes his empty sentence: “Had been watching you for a time before you dared to raise your eyes. You were perfectly oblivious. It was very endearing.”

Will wants to bury his head under the blankets and either laugh or moan his misery.

“Once you managed to make eye contact, there was really nothing I could have done.” Hannibal pauses and tacks on, “You were staring at me.”

“Well, how could I not?” Will gestures lamely with his hand and combats a yawn. “You were doing that thing with your shoulders, and you _smiled_ at me.”

“Yes, well,” Hannibal murmurs, sounding pleased, “how could I not?”

Will’s mouth flaps soundlessly, thoughts jumbled chaotically in his mind. He grins down at his rumpled bedspread.

“You should try going back to sleep,” Hannibal suggests softly. “I’ll play something else for you if you’d like.”

Doing nothing to hide the reluctance in his tone, Will acquiesces: “All right.”

Hannibal picks up the guitar again and fiddles with the tuning for a moment before starting into another song, this time with no words. At least, he doesn’t sing them. Will knows the lyrics and mouths them to himself over the lightly bouncing music.

_We lived our little drama, we kissed in a field of white, and stars fell on Alabama last night. I can't forget the glamour, your eyes held a tender light, and stars fell on Alabama last night._

Nearly asleep again, Will hears Hannibal setting the guitar down again.

“Sleep well, Will.”

“Mm, g’morn…”

He gets a soft laugh for his troubles and then the phone is sliding out of his hand and his eyes are falling shut.

In what must be a dream, Will sees Hannibal with his shiny red Charlie Christian pickup in the rocking chair on his front porch. He sees himself sitting on the railing with a bare foot perched comfortably on Hannibal’s knee while he plays. Abigail he can hear bustling about inside; can see her painting long curved lines in orange and yellow paint on a clean canvas through the window.

In his dream he’s singing with Hannibal, both their heads bent slightly and their voices soft.

_I never planned in my imagination a situation so heavenly; a fairy land where no one else could enter, and in the center, just you and me, dear. My heart beat like a hammer, my arms wound around you tight, and stars fell on Alabama last night._

He can touch Hannibal in his dream, so when the song is done he takes his hand and he holds it in both of his. To Hannibal he’s saying, as he leans in to kiss him, _I pray thee, gentle mortal sing again. I love thee._

His phone is under his arm and buzzing when he groggily blinks his eyes open at ten o’ clock. It’s Beverly calling him, and even her smiling photo somehow appears insistent. Will heaves a sigh, accepts the call, and places the phone by his ear.

He grumbles, “Beverly.”

“Will!” She’s clearly been up for a while. “Why did I have to hear from Jack that you’ll be coming back to work on Monday?”

“Because Harris signed my papers last night and because Jack hasn’t called me yet.”

“Well, you—oh, ha.”

He rubs at his eyes and slowly sits up, yawning as he does.

“So, late night then?”

There’s a suggestive chord in the question that has Will scoffing. He tells her, “I did talk to Hannibal last night, but not in the way that you think I did.”

She asks innocently, “What way?”

“You’re horrible.”

“I am an angel.”

“Yeah, okay.”

“Hey, speaking of which. Saul’s neighbor’s cat just had kittens.”

Will frowns.

“You remember how many dogs I have, right?”

“Seventeen,” she says, ignoring Will when he snorts in a very becoming manner. “Just ask around, would you? And get out of bed, you lazy slob.”

“I’m not lazy,” he says indignantly, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. When she laughs at him he says, “My sleep schedule’s been all over the place these last couple of months.”

He doesn’t mention the nightmares, and neither does she.

“I’ll see if I can find anyone who’s interested for Saul. Which one of his neighbors is it?”

“The couple with the baby; I forget their names.”

“Classy.”

“Always.”

“All right, I’m up. I need my hands now.”

“Gentlemanly,” she teases.

He pushes his shoulders back into a comfortable stretch and says, “Only on Thursday mornings.”

She lets him go after that, and he tosses his phone onto the bed. He fumbles a wrinkled shirt and a pair of sweatpants onto his body so he can get to the bathroom without flashing his underwear at Marissa or Abigail. He lets Winston and Harvey out of his room and stands in the doorway a moment listening. The house is quiet.

Will showers quickly and then goes to feed the dogs once he’s minty and properly dressed. He looks around and can find no trace of anyone inside or out. When he looks out the front window he sees Abigail’s car is gone. There’s a note waiting for him in the kitchen saying she took Marissa to work and she’ll be back in an hour or so. She left him pancakes in the microwave and he sincerely questions how he ever got on without her.

It’s as he’s eating that he hazily recollects what all he said to Hannibal last night. He eats his breakfast with persistent warmth burning up the back of his neck and in his ears. He types a text to Hannibal in between forkfuls.

_I feel kind of bad for waking up Don this morning_

A few minutes later as he’s washing his dishes, Hannibal texts back, _He’s used to it._

Will smiles and goes back to his room for his shoes. He goes digging through the closet in the one guest bedroom that Marissa slept in for his Gibson J-200. He takes it out to the backyard to sit and play for a while until Abigail returns. Will sits down and checks his phone when it buzzes again.

Jack texted him this time: _I guess Beverly told you the good news._

He smiles and types back, _She did._

Will goes back to Hannibal’s texts and stares at the thread for a while before typing, _I had a dream about you last night._

He tunes the guitar in his lap and the phone buzzes against his knee. It says, _A midsummer night’s dream._

Will laughs and shakes his head, biting his lip as he sends: _Something like that._

_But it was a good dream?_

He plucks a few open strings with his left hand and writes back with his right, _It was the best kind of good dream._

There’s a pause in between texts, so Will tests the fretboard with chords remembered almost entirely in his fingers only. He starts to play 500 Miles High. Smooth, supple notes tumble into being beneath his surprisingly dexterous fingers. The morning is still chilled with the essence of the night, and the grass still glistens in that succulent way with traces of dew and late morning sunlight.

Hannibal finally texts him, _I would hear more about it, later when Don isn’t lurking trying to steal my phone._

Will laughs and plays a while more, alternating between strumming barred jazz chords and aimlessly picking a solo from the E minor pentatonic scale. Hannibal texts him again as he’s finishing up a bluesy type of riff.

_Have I misunderstood what type of dream you had?_

Will chokes on his spit.

He types a few things or maybe a dozen before sending, _You would challenge my virtue._

If Hannibal’s nonplussed he doesn’t show it. He just replies, _I love to challenge your virtue._

Will rolls his eyes, though his face is warm and so are various other parts of his body. He types back, _It wasn’t that type of dream. And now I’m disappointed._

He laughs in spite of himself and plays around on the E major pentatonic while he waits for Hannibal’s response. He just barely keeps himself from flailing when that response turns out to be, _You don’t have to be dreaming for me to make you feel good, Will._

Will doesn’t tell Hannibal he makes him feel good anyway because he knows that’s not the point Hannibal’s trying to make. Will swallows and tells him, _Words, words, words._

Hannibal writes back, _Do you think I couldn’t?_

Will nearly drops his phone. He sets his guitar face down on his legs and blinks at his words as he’s spelling them out: _On the contrary I think you’d be very good at it._

He drums on the pale, polished body of the Gibson and reads Hannibal’s text out loud when it comes in: “Is that an invitation?”

The morning sun is warm and the breeze just this side of cool. Will basks in the luxurious warmth of the day, the sound of wind shuffling through the leaves, and the welcoming openness of the cloudless sky overhead. He sends back one word to Hannibal, the only word he can think to use: _Yes._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That’s All (Nat King Cole) by Alan Brandt and Bob Haymes  
> Fingerstyle Guitar Interpretation  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqEqZLMXmi4
> 
> _A Midsummer Night’s Dream_ (3.1.137-148) by Billy Shakespeare
> 
> Stars Fell on Alabama (Ella & Satchmo) by Frank Perkins and Mitchell Parish  
> Fingerstyle Guitar Interpretation  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040iDxhBb2Q
> 
> 500 Miles High by Chick Corea  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJxhcVnt5U8
> 
> “Words, words, words” from _Hamlet_ (2.2.192) by Billy Shakespeare
> 
> Gibson J-200  
> http://www2.gibson.com/Products/Acoustic-Instruments/Super-Jumbo/Gibson-Acoustic/J-200-Studio.aspx


	13. I Want to Be Loved

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The tour has Nemean Lion on the move again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _The stars in your eyes set my soul on fire/Your voice is like an angel above me/The touch of your hand drives me insane/But baby, I want to be loved_

Hannibal boards a train out of Oberhausen to Düsseldorf at half past four. His phone buzzes only once in his pocket to give him one telling, gracious word.

_Yes._

It is consent and purpose entwined together. It is a sensual current of electrified _want_ up and down his spine.

It’s Will telling him he wants in that way, too, and it’s _wonderful._

The train is fairly noisy but much quieter than he anticipated. They find their assigned seats with very little difficulty. Donald leads the way to their section while Hannibal trails behind them, the last of their party of five—not including the rest of the members with whom they’ve traveled. Their seats are clustered together with Donald and Abel sitting opposite Hannibal and Bedelia. Bryn sits in the row ahead with Martin, their manager.

Donald takes this extra time while the rest of the passengers are being seated to croon quietly to himself: “How glad the many millions of Annabelles and Lillians would be to capture me.” He turns to look just across the aisle at Hannibal and continues with more bravado, “But you had such persistence; you wore down my resistance. I fell, and it was swell.”

Bedelia leans over from her place at Hannibal’s side by the window. She says in a sweet, coy voice, “Don, sweetheart, we all know you have a crush on Hannibal.”

He frowns at her and Abel chortles beside him. He turns to look inconspicuously out the window when Don whips around on him.

“Bedelia, honey,” Donald coos, matching her for coyness, “you know I only have eyes for you.”

Bryn laughs, a crystal sound. She swivels about in her seat near the aisle to look at Donald.

“Except for that waitress in Vienna, you mean.” Her green and hazel eyes sparkle, the dazzling central heterochromia conveying her delight. She goes on to list “the painter in Milan, the flight attendant on the plane to Leipzig, and the bartender in Prague last year for whom you wrote the most beautiful love poems.” 

Abel gives Donald an incredulous look, and Bedelia scoffs, much too entertained at the man’s plight.

He protests, the tips of his ears turning bright red, “I did not write love poems.”

“Oh, you did, though,” she teases back in her naturally sultry voice. “ _My Oria, you are the goddess of my dawn._ ”

Donald elbows Abel when he begins to laugh, a desperate sort of laugh he had tried to stifle but failed. He hisses, “I’m going to kill you, Bryn Fuller.”

Hannibal muses, “So it’s true then?”

“I hate you all,” Donald groans, slouching in his seat and covering his face.

Abel pats his knee encouragingly. He proclaims in his signature drawl, “Well, it’s tough to compete with the goddess of your dawn.”

Donald pinches the bridge of his nose and shakes his head, muttering, “I’m in hell, I’m in hell.”

Satisfyingly fatted on Donald’s embarrassment, Bryn turns to face the front again and Abel goes back to staring out the window. Bedelia opens once more to the book of poetry resting in her lap, a pen in her hand to leave notes in the margins surrounding the cantos of Ezra Pound. Hannibal places his hand over his phone. The train begins to move.

Will’s _yes_ remains unanswered on the screen.

Hannibal considers what he can possibly say to Will now that this particular gambit has been unloosed in their relationship. Of course he isn’t nervous about his performance, even if perhaps it has been a while since the last time. Seduction has never been a card he had any problem playing. He’s anxious for how the two of them will go about handling it, but his anxiety is of an anticipated breed.

He is also timid, and he’s certain Will feels similarly, like the floor may give out from underneath their feet at any given moment. However, Will just seems to be of the opinion that Hannibal is the more surefooted participant in this endeavor they’ve undertaken.

Quite a lot of time has gone by with Hannibal rubbing his thumb over the back of his phone and studying the headrest of Bryn’s seat as the train shuffles them along. They arrive at Bahnhof Düsseldorf-Unterrath at 4:58. Donald catches the first cab to Düsseldorf International. The rest of them ride to the airport in pairs: Abel with Bedelia and Hannibal with Bryn. He gives their destination to the driver and turns to Bryn. She is already giving him an expectant look.

She says, “Don says you asked to borrow his guitar this morning.”

“Will called.”

“Did you play him the song we’ve been working on?”

There’s a wickedly pleased gleam in her eyes to which he’s become very endeared in the time that he’s known her.

“Yes, and he responded very positively.”

“He responded very positively,” she repeats, raising an eyebrow. “That’s it. You’re not going to give me any _details_?”

“You’ve been spending too much time with my sister,” he deflects. “You have her gift for tact and subtlety.”

“Sarcasm doesn’t become you, Hanny-goose.”

“Too much time with my sister,” Hannibal sighs, rubbing the heel of his hand across his forehead. He mumbles, “Jūs man sielvartingas.”

“Oh, oh, siela is soul.” She taps his arm with the back of her fingers. Her expression is one of exuberance. “That was one of the first ones I learned. What’s sielvartingas?”

She pronounces it correctly on the first try; her knack for languages is an admirable trait.

“It means grievous.”

For a moment she looks almost repentant, but then her eyes narrow and she says, “How do you say drama queen?”

He laughs and tells her, “Nieszczery primadona.”

She punches his arm gently, a small smile blooming across her lips. They get to the airport and promptly meet up with the others. When Bryn asks him again how to say drama queen he writes it down on the back of a German pamphlet and she practices it under her breath while they sit in the terminal. When she thinks she has it down she says it to the first person to speak to her, which happens to be Abel.

Hannibal gives himself some distance from the group of them and takes out his phone. Will’s text stares up at him, daring him to break the gaping silence he’s left between them. Will is probably busy now. It’s been nearly an hour since he sent that message.

Surely Will would have texted him something else if he still wanted to discuss the subject. Maybe it was a fluke that Hannibal brought it up—he hadn’t meant to bring it up; the conversation had simply lead up to it. His suggestion and Will’s response to it could have been misinterpreted as ordinary flirtation without intent. He scrolls up and down, eyeing the thread with agitation and indecision. He startles when Abel’s voice floats leisurely over his shoulder.

“Why did you tell Bryn to call me a _histrionic diva_?”

Abel stares blankly at Hannibal when he spins around.

“Hannibal?”

“What?”

Abel opens his mouth, pauses to blink at Hannibal, and says, “Bryn, Lithuanian, insulting my manhood, weird translations. What’s got you jumpy?”

“Nothing,” Hannibal answers too quickly.

He winces at how defensive he sounds. Abel frowns, more pronouncedly than usual.

Managing to sound more concerned than he looks, he asks, “Problems with your paramour?”

Hannibal bristles. Abel’s back straightens, though his expression softens at the same time.

“He’s got you blushing and stammering just like a schoolboy, this Will Graham.” Abel smiles, the perfect picture of affability to someone who doesn’t know him the way Hannibal does. He says, “The Penthesilea to your famously granitic Achilles.”

“I am not granitic, and that is a horrid comparison to make.”

“Love is love.” Abel shrugs, rolling his shoulders and looking up at the ceiling. “Everyone’s got to have someone.”

“It’s none of your business.”

“Mm, true,” he says slowly, studying the ceiling a while more. He lowers his chin and brings his gaze back to Hannibal’s face. “If you’re concerned about what I think,” he starts, giving Hannibal an apathetic, assessing look and shaking his head just slightly. “You really shouldn’t be.”

Hannibal snaps back, “My concern or lack thereof doesn’t keep you from having an opinion.”

“Also true.”

They watch each other, Hannibal determined not to crack and Abel giving nothing away of his position. Uncharacteristically, he folds first.

“Do you remember when Katya served me the divorce papers?”

It’s not as if it was a recurring event that Hannibal would have to strain to remember. He even recalls the conversation with perfect clarity, Abel calmly relaying the facts of the day as if it were no different than any other.

_Well, wouldn’t you know, Hannibal, I went and saw a film this morning with my nephew—the one in college with the long hair, going to be a surgeon, did I tell you?—and I came home to have lunch with Katya, and there she was with her hair done up in curls looking fit to sing on top of a grand piano the way she always does. And there, on the kitchen table, right by my favorite coffee mug, divorce papers. She said, you knew this was coming, Abel, and I said, did I because this feels like a goddamned knife in my gut, Katya._

And Hannibal had told him, just as calmly, _I’ve made Saffron cake._

_Your lips say saffron, but the subtext screams vodka._

_My sister speaks loudly enough for the subtext to be wholly unnecessary._

“Just because I had a wife once,” Abel says with a minute shrug. “If you recall, I showed up for our gig the day after our first date and wouldn’t shut up about how…” He smiles at the memory. “How perfect she was—how I _knew_ I’d marry her someday if she let me.”

Hannibal feels his shoulders relax, though he can tell Abel isn’t finished speaking.

“Sometimes when you know, you know.”

“That isn’t normally what you say to Donald.”

“This kind of thing is fun for him. He loves the chase, whether he’s making friends or acquiring a new lover.”

“He has always been charismatic.”

“It isn’t a deficit of charisma,” Abel muses warmly. His eyes are soft. “This thing you’ve stumbled into; it frightens you a great deal more than you let on.” He bows his head forward slightly and locks eyes with Hannibal. With an understated flourish he surmises, “How could you show it? Will Graham’s got stories following him around like ghosts, nasty ones; the kind with claws. You’ve got to wear a brave face in front of him just like you think you do in front of us.

“You think we’ll mock you for it—that we’ll sneer because yours with Will Graham is a whirlwind romance.”

Hannibal clenches his jaw, denial pressing heavily on his tongue.

“Even if you don’t care a wink what I say or what any of us say—and you shouldn’t— the thought still persists.” Abel nods, eyes closing. “The mind is like that: obstinately compulsive about the things we’d most like to ignore and dangerously attached to the thing we’d most like to forget.”

Abel pushes his hands into his back pockets. He tilts his head to one side, an incomparably open expression on his face. It’s paired with a slight narrowing of his eyes, an outward show of the gears in his mind turning.

Gently he asks, “Do you want to talk about Will Graham, Hannibal?” As if sensing Hannibal is about to shut him out, he adds, “Bryn is young, in the way that your sister is young; she’ll listen and boost your spirits, but Will Graham is a puppy in her eyes—at least until she meets him properly. Bedelia might hear you out, but she’s never been in love and you know the way she thinks; she’ll reduce this beautiful thing to mechanical parts and tell you how it works and it won’t be beautiful anymore. You could try Don, but I think you know how that scenario is most likely to play out.”

Hannibal blinks, giving their band mates a glance around Abel’s side. Bedelia is still preoccupied with Ezra Pound, and Bryn and Donald have their chairs pushed close together, both of them highly engrossed in whatever it is they’re discussing. Hannibal slides his hand over the phone in his pocket, conflicted.

“I may have told him that I’m in love with him,” Hannibal confesses in a quiet voice.

Abel doesn’t look surprised. He just asks, “Was he happy to hear you say it?”

_He said I was hopeless._

_I’m so happy._

Hannibal swallows.

“I didn’t say it in so many words.”

He asks, “Did he?”

Abel has the grace and stoicism to be calm in any situation. He would fare well in an occupation that required him to hold his hands steady in an emergency. Hannibal had seen it often enough in his current line of work.

“No.” Hannibal refrains from saying _not exactly_ because the answer is still no.

_And that’s it, isn’t it?_

Abel seems to understand when Hannibal does.

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” he assures him.

His tone suggests it is an offhanded comment, but his expression speaks of vodka and saffron cake made with too much Swedish white pearl sugar and Mischa muttering tipsily into Abel’s shoulder that he’s an _išvaizdus žmogus, Mr. Gideon, just beautiful in a rugged sort of way, don’t you think, didysis brolis berniklitė?_

Abel says, “It doesn’t have to be the worst thing, this time apart.”

The affectionate pull in Hannibal’s chest fades at the sight of the lecherous smile on Abel’s face. It falls off straight away, and Hannibal steels his expression, trying to guess at what emotion he may have just given away.

Squinting, Abel muses, “Is that why you’re moping in the corner over here by yourself?”

“I do not mope,” Hannibal sniffs indignantly.

“You very much do, my darling man. It’s one of my favorite things.” Hannibal scowls and Abel smirks. He says, “Honestly, of all the milestones to be _nervous_ over.” He adds, shaking his head fondly, “You lovelorn fool.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“Hannibal,” Abel says at the tail end of a low chuckle. “Did you not see the way that man followed you out of the club that night in Baltimore?”

Hannibal looks off to the side, reviewing the memory. He’d been looking at Will and someone had whistled, distracting him and exposing the landscape of his neck as he turned away. Will’s pupils had blown wide open when he asked if he wanted to go somewhere more private and he had looked down to watch Hannibal’s mouth as he smiled. Hannibal had known then that he would, at the very least, have to kiss the man before the night was through.

Hannibal’s eyes had even lingered a while when Will slid carefully off the stool and spread his legs a little as his feet touched ground, an inviting, warm kind of gesture and a complete accident, of course. Will wouldn’t have done it on purpose, Hannibal knows now. He wouldn’t have pressed his hips up off the chair the way that he had in any other way but for practicality’s sake. His movements had been purely functional and never ornamental, and Hannibal had been able to tell, even as he let his eyes wander and categorize the movements he liked versus the ones he absolutely had to see again.

“Smitten, disgustingly so.” Abel gestures at Hannibal, evidently making a blanket statement about him and Will both. “I’m sure he’d like it if you dictated the phonebook or recited the periodic table. I’ve heard you read _Faust_ in the original German print, Hannibal; I’m not just whistling Dixie here.”

Donald walks up behind him and grabs his shoulders.

“Too bad,” he teases, bumping his chin on the top of Abel’s head. “I like it when you whistle Dixie.”

“You like it when anyone whistles Dixie,” Abel grumbles, squirming out from underneath Donald’s chin. He doesn’t shrug off the arm Donald slings around his shoulders. “You’re an easy man to please.”

Donald purrs, enunciating for Abel’s sake, “Wer weiß, warum die Gänse barfuß gehen?”

_Who knows why the geese walk bare foot?_

Abel rolls his eyes at the German idiom he doesn’t recognize. Hannibal coos back, “A philosopher at heart.”

“Nothing you didn’t already know; now, are you gents coming back to the group, or are you set on leaving me with the women?”

Abel snorts, “You like being left with the women.”

“Can I help that I love what I love? Can any of us?”

Donald gives Hannibal a meaningful glance, to which Hannibal makes a face. Donald grins and turns with Abel still under wing. He reaches for Hannibal, and the three of them make for the waiting area where Bryn and Bedelia are now sitting with Martin. Hannibal takes a seat beside Abel, only trusting him not to read his messages to Will over his shoulder as he finally types back, _I look forward to the opportunity._

Considering that they have at least another half hour before the plane will be ready for them, Hannibal dials his sister’s number and eases more comfortably into his decidedly uncomfortable chair. She answers straight away, chatter and ambient clamoring filling the background noise around her.

“Brother mine!”

“Hello, sister.” Bryn and Abel look over. “How does this afternoon find you?”

“It finds me speaking to my lamb of a brother, so it finds me smiling.” He smiles small to himself. “Oh, and I’ve had a productive morning. I finished a full back tattoo just before my lunch.”

“ _The Dancer in Green_?”

“No, that’s still in the works. This one was based on a William Blake painting.”

_The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun._

“That has been months in the making, has it not?”

“Yes, but it’s completed now and absolutely gorgeous,” she preens. Wistfully she remarks, “I’ll have to send you some of the photos I snapped before he put his clothes on and stormed out of my life.” She sighs, “So like a man.” He looks up at the ceiling and then out through the windows at the early evening dying the sky blue at the horizon and gray higher up. “Speaking of handsome men with fantastic glutes—how is your lovely Will Graham?”

He makes a sputtering noise and she laughs. In a pinched voice he says, “Will is fine.”

She clears her throat.

“I had thought I might invite him and his darling girl for dinner one of these nights. Do you think he would object?”

Hannibal isn’t honestly sure. By all accounts, Will and Abigail both enjoy Mischa’s company.

“Why would anyone object to spending more time with you, mylimas sesute?”

“You are unfairly biased, brother.” She does sound pleased, though, even as she discredits his input. “Has this distance from home treated you cruelly?”

He sets his free hand on his knee and blinks down at his fingers. Before stopping home in Baltimore for that week that he met Will, Nemean Lion had played shows up and down the East Coast. They had been preparing for the tour Martin promised them and hadn’t been exactly braced for a back-to-back type of arrangement such as this one.

“Hannibal?”

“It isn’t what I expected,” he says, speaking vaguely but in a manner that she will comprehend perfectly. “Of course, I miss you as always.”

“You do so love for us to be attached at the hip,” she murmurs warmly. The noise tinkling and rustling over her voice does nothing to muffle her words or stop the contented reassurance from spreading in his chest. “And what of Will Graham? Do you miss your darling music teacher?”

Hannibal reflects on what he knows of his _darling music teacher_. He reexamines the stronghold of his memory for the scars across the man’s chest that explain trauma and survival, the words scrawled across Will’s ribs that detail his youth, and the soft sounds Will makes in his sleep when he rolls over onto his side that tell Hannibal close to nothing but that he adores all the same.

Splendid pictures of Will twisting and groaning and pressing against him flash across the black expanse of his closed eyelids. The sight is there and gone in an instant, modeled in the fashion of a falling star.

Softly he says, “Very much.”

She is quiet for just a few seconds, appreciating the lull of this exchange between them for the rarity that it is. The exact moment it begins to wash away, she cheerfully informs him, “I’m going to tell him so many embarrassing stories about you over dinner.”

_Mischa wanted me to tell you that I know about the woodblock prints and that if you don’t bring the sorbet out soon she’ll start telling me the really embarrassing stories, starting with something about an ant preserved in amber?_

He grumbles, “As if it isn’t bad enough you’ve already told Abigail about the woodblock prints.”

Bryn barks a laugh, reminding him of her and Abel’s presences on either side of him. Abel just lifts an eyebrow, his expression torn between boredom and curiosity. Bryn leans back in her chair to whisper behind Hannibal’s back, “I’ll tell you on the plane.”

He covers her mouth with his free hand, holding the phone with the other.

“Sleep well on the plane, brother,” Mischa says to him sweetly.

He yanks his hand back when he feels Bryn open her mouth to bite him. She stares back at him with no hint of remorse or irritation, though her quivering stomach suggests she may burst out into laughter as soon as Hannibal ends the call with his sister.

“I love you,” he enunciates, bringing his eyes away from Bryn’s face to the gritty tile at his feet.

Just as seriously, she answers, “Myliu tave labai, tu berniklitė.”

“Bryn and Abel send their regards.”

Bryn beams at him, and Abel nudges his arm with his elbow. Mischa hums.

“I miss all of you, even Don.”

Hannibal chuckles in spite of himself and glances up at Donald, sitting across from Hannibal at Bedelia’s left hand and pointing at a line in her book. He says something too softly for Hannibal to hear, looks up into her eyes for a response, and grins devilishly when she solemnly shakes her head no. He gestures with his hands as if he were estimating the size of a fish he caught, and a sharp, surprised laugh passes her lips. She swats him once with her hand.

Bryn sees the exchange, too, and smirks, laying forehead on Hannibal’s shoulder as Donald starts to laugh at the effect of his joke on Bedelia. Hannibal smiles, wholly aware that his sister is as fond of Donald as any of them are.

“I will call you when we land in Brussels.”

“You had better,” she sings. “Be safe, brother.”

As soon as he hangs up, Martin rouses from his spot on the other side of Donald and gets them up and moving. Hannibal’s phone buzzes in his pocket while they’re navigating through the airport for the Du Maurier’s private jet.

The text is from Will. He writes, _It’s okay if we don’t do anything tonight. You’re flying to Brussels tonight aren’t you?_

_We will be in the air soon._

_Call me when you get settled?_

Hannibal smiles and texts back, _Yes._

He feels a bit silly about his unnecessary panic over the state of his relationship with Will. They are adults; people go for much longer than four months without seeing each other. He had certainly been made to do it when he left for boarding school as a youth and then later when Mischa left for ENSBA— _you’ve got to say the full name, Hannibal: École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts._

Will had made out like four months wouldn’t be any kind of imposition. He had been calm when he said he could wait and that he wanted to, for Hannibal. He only looked worried about whether Hannibal was okay it.

All is quiet when they get onto the plane. Bedelia switches out her book of poetry for Hardy’s _Return of the Native_. She takes a glass of wine once they’re in the air. Abel busies himself watching a documentary on one of the small monitors with his earphones plugged in, unaware of Bryn sitting off to one side sketching his unconscious pout. Donald reclines in his seat with a guitar he smuggled out of an ATA case in the back of the plane. He lightly strums some chords, humming softly to himself as he does.

Hannibal sits behind him and gazes out the window for a time, listening to the lazy music. He untangles Donald’s arms from the guitar’s body and fretboard when he inevitably nods off. Bedelia is also asleep, legs curled up on the seat with the book loosely clasped in her hand and a blanket haphazardly thrown over her feet.

Hannibal holds the Firebird Custom in his lap. He peers out the window at the darkness concealing the clouds and traces the green vinyl electrical tape covering a dent the instrument acquired one spring in Montélimar.

He and Donald had taken the guitar down to a bank near the Rhône to play. They sang Les Feuilles Mortes by the water, and a Parisian man had whistled and smiled at Donald. Flustered, he’d whipped around and smacked the end of the guitar into a tree. Hannibal had placed the tape over the unseemly scratches in the nitrocellulose finish like a Band-Aid over a skinned knee and Donald had never removed it.

Hannibal makes chord shapes over the ebony fingerboard and presses the strings with all five digits of his right hand, just hard enough to make the softest sounds ring beneath the pressure. Bryn has since revealed her drawing to Abel and taken up watching the documentary with him. The earphones are split between the two of them, her sketch resting beneath Abel’s loose fist. He eyes it every few minutes, a concerned expression on his face like he can’t decide whether or not he likes the rendering of him.

By the time Hannibal starts to feel drowsy, his fingers have taken to picking out phrases of That’s All and trying to capture the melody of Georgia from obscurity. He manages to find the latter, but the former is much more familiar and he can play it quietly without too much exploration or concentration.

Bryn falls asleep with her head on Abel’s shoulder, and with the unabashed boldness of one not under observation, Abel smiles down at her peaceful expression. He strains slightly to look back at Hannibal and raises the sketch up into the air so Hannibal can see it.

He murmurs, “Do I really look like that?”

Hannibal smiles around his whispered response: “You do, yes.”

Abel laughs softly. He says, “Your sister ever draw you?”

“She has, in the past.”

“They ever any good?” Hannibal tilts his head; Abel rolls his eyes. “Okay, but do they ever _look_ like you?”

“Occasionally. Sometimes she goes the way of abstraction and my head looks like an overlarge acorn.”

Abel contains his laughter so he won’t risk jostling Bryn where she sleeps still on his shoulder. He murmurs, “Know any lullabies?”

“Do you have a specific request?” Hannibal readies the guitar in his hands, a determined but sleepy expression on his face that has Abel smirking. “Brahms?”

“Strauss, maybe.”

“Wiegenlied?”

“Sure.”

Hannibal plays, hands working about as slowly as he feels the chord progressions shifting through his mind just seconds before he must play them. He doesn’t register falling asleep or Donald waking him maybe an hour later when the plane lands. He jokes, plucking the guitar out of Hannibal’s lap, “Always after my job.”

They make their way to the hotel and Hannibal calls Mischa outside the terminal slumped against a monolith of a pillar while Bryn and Donald sit on their luggage and Bedelia flags a cab. Mischa teases him for sounding inebriated and keeps their call short, telling him she invited Will and Abigail both for dinner next week and they said yes. Hannibal says something to the effect of, “Please not the story about the ant preserved in amber.”

All she has to say in reply to his plea is, “I make no promises.”

Hannibal doesn’t attempt to call Will until he’s halfway unpacked and showered and dressed for bed. It’s half past ten by that time, and while he could probably sleep if he tried, much of his exhaustion from the flight has receded.

Will says, cheerfully, Hannibal notes, “Have a good trip?”

“It was enjoyable, yes.”

“I guess that’s what flying is like when your drummer owns a jet.”

Hannibal smirks, flipping the light switch and laying down.

“It belongs to the Du Maurier family,” he echoes Bedelia’s words every time Donald mentions her possession of any one of the resplendent properties or assets attributed to her name. “In two weeks’ time we will be struggling not to kill each other.”

Will snorts and asks, “Whose idea was it to be on tour for four months?”

His tone is casual, but there’s more to the words than what Hannibal can hear on the surface.

He says, “Initially, our manager had campaigned for a European tour that would have us traveling from August to the beginning of October.”

“And then the second half was added to the schedule.”

“Yes,” Hannibal confirms. “Donald has his heart set against exhaustion. I’m uncertain as to how well that goal will pan out for him, or any of us, really.”

“You’ll have a break after the show in Lyon, won’t you?” There’s a sound of shuffling. “Abigail showed me the tour page, and now I kind of look at it every once in a while. She, um, pointed out that you’ve got a two-week break in between gigs. I was wondering if you were planning on coming back sometime in October, before the Belarus show.”

“I had considered it.” He rubs a hand over his chest distractedly. “It would be a much-needed breath of fresh air.”

“It would,” Will says softly.

Hannibal smiles; feels himself calmly nestled in that strange but safe warmth that fills him whenever Will’s presence becomes a more acute constant in his life. He closes his eyes and tells him what he told Mischa several hours ago at Düsseldorf International: “I miss you.”

It hurts to say it, in a bright, ecstatic kind of way. Saying it doesn’t dissolve the strength of his smile.

He smiles wider when Will says it back.

“I miss your hands,” Will clarifies wistfully. “I miss looking at them.”

Hannibal huffs a soft laugh. “Is that all you miss about them?”

“Well, no.” Will laughs, too.

Hannibal hears footsteps and a door closing. He hears fabric rustling.

Will says, “I miss the way you touch me.”

Something in Hannibal’s stomach dips, like looking down from a great height. He swallows, realizing what is happening even as he lets himself relax into it.

He asks, breathless already, “In what way do I touch you?”

“Like you know exactly how my body’s going to move before you even lay your hands on me.”

“The way your body moves fascinates me,” Hannibal admits in the way of an explanation. He goes back to the image he has in his mind of Will sliding of the barstool, his legs inching apart and his hips rolling outward just so to propel him off the chair. “I love the way you respond; I love the feel of your skin beneath my fingers.”

Will’s breathing is soft but quickened in its pace. Softly, so softly, he asks, “Hannibal?”

He hums, rolling his head back against the pillow. “What is it?”

“Are we doing this?”

Hannibal bites his lip and says, “I would like to, if…”

“Yes,” Will sighs with something like relief. Something clunks heavily onto the floor, followed by another just like it. The sheets on Will’s bed rustle. His voice has grown shy when he speaks again. “I’ve never done this before.”

The heat pooling in Hannibal’s chest travels down to his stomach and churns. He exhales noisily, eyes fluttering shut as he forces himself to calm down and rein in his control. Hannibal eases his pajamas pants down passed his hips, arching his back and making just the softest of sounds when his shoulders pop. He whispers, “What will you do to me when I come home to you, Will?”

There’s a choked off groan and then breathing. Hannibal smirks, wondering what part of his question affected Will so viscerally. Will replies, quite seriously, “I’m going to take you to dinner.”

Hannibal laughs before he can think better of it. Will chuckles, too, though the sound is darker from his lips, heavier in his current state. He hums and mumbles, in the same way that he does when he is evading sleep, “I’ll take care of you. When you come home to me, I’ll make you feel so good, Hannibal.”

He sounds that way when Hannibal has his hands under his shirt and when Hannibal’s kissing him in between words. Hannibal loves this voice, rougher but impossibly soft in an entirely different way.

Hannibal licks his lips, heart pounding around the confession he isn’t ready to share so directly.

Instead he says, “I can make you feel good tonight.”

Will makes a noise like an aborted hum and answers, “You always make me feel good.”

Hannibal hopes that will remain the case for as long as Will is his to treasure and adore. The words froth and tickle at the mound of his throat at the same time that it closes up and keeps him from breathing or saying anything. This thing he has found with Will, as beautiful and perilous as a great waterfall or a spark, does frighten him. To have such power and to have it linked so indelibly with another person, to be responsible for his happiness…

“Will.”

“I’m here, Hannibal.”

It’s all he wants. It’s all that matters to him, and he can tell that Will knows.

Unbelievably, it doesn’t frighten him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lithuanian translations  
> Jūs man sielvartingas > You make me grievous; you give me grief.  
> Išvaizdus žmogus > handsome man  
> Didysis brolis berniklitė > big brother goose (diminutive)  
> Mylimas sesute > beloved sister (diminutive)  
> Myliu tave labai, tu berniklitė > I love you very much, you goose (diminutive)
> 
> German translations  
> Wer weiß, warum die Gänse barfuß gehen > Who knows why the geese walk barefoot? (German idiom: There is a reason for everything, though it may not be obvious)  
> *Thank you, Salyiha, for being my German checker
> 
> I’ve Got a Crush on You (Sinatra) by George and Ira Gershwin  
> Les Feuilles Mortes (Fallen Leaves) by Yves Montand
> 
> _The Dancer in Green_ by Edgar Degas  
>  _The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun_ (AHEM) by William Blake  
>  _Faust_ by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
> 
> Butter Saffron Cake  
> http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Butter-Saffron-Cake
> 
> Fancy private jet  
> http://www.airpartner.com/Images/en-us/Private%20Jets/Sliders/Private%20jet%20interior.jpg
> 
> Gibson Firebird  
> http://www2.gibson.com/Products/Acoustic-Instruments/Square-Shoulder/Gibson-Acoustic/Firebird-Custom.aspx


	14. She's a Rainbow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will spends some time with Mischa Lecter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Have you seen her all in gold?/Like a queen in days of old/She shoots her colors all around/Like a sunset going down/Have you seen a lady fairer?_

Will throws a ball and watches the gorgeous Great Dane called Bixie go bounding after it, all long limbs and flopping ears. He turns, quite out of breath from running the massive, energetic animal around the park to her owner, one Mischa Lecter. She smiles at him, a dimple showing in one cheek and a lock of blonde-almost brown hair falling across her forehead.

Accusingly but lightheartedly, she muses, “She absolutely adores you, Mr. Graham.”

“I have a few of my own.” He shrugs, laughing when Tianlu, the brown-speckled Brittany spaniel comes nudging his hand with his nose. Mischa is watching him with a mildly amused expression, a conspiratorial glint in her eyes that he’s sure she learned from Hannibal or the other way around. He asks, “What?

“Abigail told me you had seven.”

It’s something of a point of reference for him that he can always detect when he’s blushing, and he is now but not because he has seven dogs—he got over the typical shock reaction some years ago when he took in dog number five. Mischa is Hannibal’s sister. She’s here in her elegant, loosely fitting black and gray plaid dress turning a Frisbee over in her hands. She’s smiling at him, too; the devious shine has taken its leave. He isn’t sure she has it in her to be really devious.

Probably that’s the most beautiful thing about her. The tattoos—hidden now beneath the long sleeves of her dress—are fascinating and artistic; her talent is praise-worthy; Abigail likes her; she has two beautiful, sociable dogs.

He’s been planning a way to introduce them to his pack from the minute he saw them. One of his favorite daydreams is Hannibal throwing the Frisbee for Tianlu the way Mischa throws it now. He can imagine Hannibal doing it just the way she does, curling his wrist in and then unfolding his arm in a fluid arc to throw the disk for the ecstatic Brittany spaniel who wastes no time running after it and catching it before it touches ground.

Tianlu brings back the Frisbee expediently, accepting Mischa’s affections gladly but gracefully. It’s a marvel she manages to look so casual yet so effortlessly elegant. She has that in common, as with so many other things, with her brother. She also reminds him, heavily, of Alana Bloom.

She catches him staring, which isn’t an astonishing accomplishment all things considered, and asks, laughing, “What is that look for?”

“I was just thinking how interesting you are,” he confesses, not blushing now but petting Bixie when she comes back to his side and drops a very slimy ball at his feet. He gives Mischa a lopsided smile and throws the ball again, marveling at the dog’s speed and stride. He turns as she’s looping her arm through his and leading him down a wide bike trail. The length of Tianlu’s leash is loosely coiled between her hands, the collared Brittany walking patiently at her side.

Will looks over his shoulder and whistles, but Bixie is already bounding back for them, slowing down when she draws nearer and obediently dropping the ball again at his feet. He takes her leash from Mischa and clasps it to the dog’s collar before standing straight and holding the ball a bit at a loss.

“Here,” Mischa offers, holding open the cloth bag on her shoulder.

He carefully tucks the ball in next to the Frisbee, glancing only cursorily inside to make sure there’s nothing that might be damaged or dirtied by excessive dog drool and bits of grass. There’s just a small selection of dog toys and a plastic baggie with Mischa’s phone, keys, and wallet safely tucked inside.

A compliment seems in order, so he says, “You come prepared.”

“I have two large dogs,” she counters, tipping her head and smiling softly at Tianlu and then at Bixie. Directing her attention back to the former sitting pretty beside her she adds, “Imagine what I looked like eight years ago when Hannibal brought this one home.”

Will laughs, and they start walking again, the Great Dane on Will’s left and the Brittany on Mischa’s right. She loops her arm through his again, and they walk. It’s comfortable between them; she’s open and inviting in a way that would put Will off probably if he weren’t so eager to be in her good graces. Undoubtedly Mischa read his eagerness from day one and has done very little to capitalize on it.

“He a trouble maker?”

“When he was a pup, yes; got into everything.” She chuckles, a light, surprised sound. “A bit like Hannibal when we were younger.”

“Really?”

“Oh, yes,” she confirms, gazing up at the sky as they walk together. “It was a great source of amusement to our aunt and uncle, when we went to live with them.”

Will nods and carefully doesn’t ask how old they were or under what circumstances they came to live with Robertus. He asks, “What is your aunt’s name?”

“Hmm, oh, that’s right. You met Uncle already. Her name is Murasaki. Well, it’s what she prefers to be called anyway; she has another name she never uses but for official documents.”

“Are you close?”

“ _We_ are, but I’m not always on the move, am I?” Her smile is small when he looks. “Uncle is quite fond of Brother, but Oba can be difficult to please. They had a falling out when Hannibal finished at university. She wanted him to be a doctor.” She rolls her eyes fondly. “If you can imagine Hannibal as a doctor.”

“I could,” Will murmurs confidentially. “What focus?”

“Oh, surgery. When he was a boy he wanted to do everything.”

“You said he _got_ into everything. What does that…?”

She hums and then laughs, a clear, ringing sound, and shakes her head.

“My brother was always the adventurous sort, very curious. The moment something beautiful caught his eye he’d be after it in complete childish abandon. He grew out of his distractibility with age, but well, habits persist, don’t they?”

He stays quiet to hear more, but nothing else seems forthcoming. It isn’t an issue he’ll press if she has nothing to volunteer freely. Probably the appropriate thing to do would be to ask Hannibal himself rather than go through his sister. Just as he’s preparing another topic for discussion she surprises him as is so often her tendency.

“Did you know that he gave me Tianlu? He was a belated birthday present.”

Mischa bumps his shoulder with her cheek, an incidental transference of affection for the dog perking up at the sound of his name from his master’s lips. Will nods yes. It had come up on the phone with Hannibal one night after Mischa had him and Abigail over for dinner. There had been a hundred things for them to talk about that night, but the first thing out of Will’s mouth had been, _Your sister has dogs?_

“Found him at Bristol, didn’t he; or well, the way he tells it I guess Don found him?”

“He did.” Her smile is changed at the mention of Don, affable for all that she is entirely in her element. “He was a skinny thing then, my Tian, missing patches of his coat here and there. He couldn’t have been more than a few years old, but the way he looked; Hannibal brought him home and he said, ‘Mischa, how on earth did this pup of yours wander all the way to England? Aren’t you minding him?’ I told him he was out of his mind.” She drops her eyes, coloring in her cheeks and down the line of her jaw. Quietly she adds, “He’s always been a little neurotic in the most amazing ways.”

Will can’t help but study her in this accidental moment of nostalgia interspersed with unnamed chagrin, but the second he catches himself doing it he snaps his eyes instead to Tianlu taking short trotting steps and sniffing the grass intently, almost suspiciously. He imagines the spaniel much younger, unfairly ravished for his years; imagines Hannibal wrapping the puppy he would have been up in a blanket, taking him home on the plane, and delivering him to Mischa’s doorstep like an orphaned newborn.

_And thy fair virtue’s force perforce doth move me on the first view to say, to swear, I love thee._

“Sometimes it’s love at first sight,” he murmurs, smiling and warming helplessly at the pictures he’s created in his mind.

As if he knows Will is having sentimental thoughts about him, Tianlu looks up at him and wags his tail as he’s walking. It’s the walk Simon and Winston sometimes use when they think Will has a treat for them in his hand. He can’t help but smile.

“Sometimes it is,” Mischa agrees evenly, still walking in perfect step with him.

She has her brother’s gift for perception, a proclivity for parsing out meaning to match—if not outshine—Will’s. He laughs, tipping his head back and rubbing the back of his hand across his forehead, caught.

“I know you won’t hurt my brother, Will,” she says softly, startling him out of his head and tripping his feet under him. Bixie prances a bit when he reorients himself, monitoring him. Mischa doesn’t react to his stumble. “I can see that you won’t.”

“Well, I…never _want_ to,” he hedges.

“Hannibal is my closest family; sometimes he’s the only one to which I can stand to attribute the word.”

“Robertus and Murasaki?”

“I was young when they took us in; my earliest memories are of living with them. Our Oba and Uncle are very dear to me, of course, but my brother has always been my teacher, my hero, and my confidante.”

They walk a ways more in silence, and the gravity of what she’s entrusting him with threatens to trip up his feet a second time. He sensed that there was a closeness, a precious intimacy, between the siblings; he detected in Hannibal that his sister was the geometrical origin to his axes. Seeing its like echoed perfectly in Mischa is another thing entirely. It’s private. It stirs Will up inside, frenetically, the way leaves circle and levitate in the short-lived burst of a whirlwind.

Words don’t find him in time. There’s more on her mind for him to hear, so he doesn’t struggle where his nerves are pushing him towards verbosity.

“There is much in this world that Hannibal loves.”

_There was really nothing I could have done._

She continues, “His great flaw is that he cannot separate what he loves from what he needs.”

“What do you mean?”

Mischa stops in her stride, stopping him, too. The dogs at either side of them cross behind them and greet each other, Tianlu sniffing his companion’s collar and Bixie licking his ear.

“You have an idea what he’s like by now. What do you think I mean?”

Will’s ideas of what Hannibal is like have been shaped by mornings in waking up effusively curious as to just what crazy thing Hannibal might do, what Will might learn from him and how, what the next memory they would make together would be. It isn’t strange at all to hear that Hannibal loves what he needs and needs what he loves—

Although that logic means he needs Will.

“Huh,” he mumbles, only half-realizing the word makes its way out of him. He brings his eyes back to her, sharpening his focus from its blurry pinpoint on Bixie’s speckled face to Mischa’s eyes. The sunlight’s catching in them, so close to the deep hazel of her brother’s but closer to a composite of gray and green than brown on the spectrum. He says, hoping to alleviate the worried lines over her eye brows, “I know what you mean.”

She looks ready to ask whether he does in actuality, but the worry subsides and she is only intrigued. Her eyes widen a bit, letting that much more sunshine in and drawing his attention to a dark fleck present in her right eye only.

“Will Graham,” she muses in a soft, unabashedly pleased voice that makes his ears burn. “Are you in love with my brother?”

He laughs, the only honest response he can handle having when she’s pointing an expression at him that says he’s something to be cherished, and maybe he is in her eyes. Bixie walks with him again when he clicks his tongue and turns to press on down the trail. Mischa chuckles behind him and jogs to catch up with him, Tianlu’s collar jangling with the short run.

“You’re a bit remarkable, do you know that?”

Blushing furiously he says, “Because I love your brother?”

“Because my brother loves you, silly goose,” she corrects him, sliding her arm through his again. Over his long sigh she adds, “I know he’s told you as much.”

“He dances around it.” He trips over a rock in his path. Bixie gives him another concerned look. “I do, too.”

Mischa doesn’t speak for a while; when Will glances in her direction a tiny, obviously satisfied smile rests on her lips. Her eyes are closed and her chin tilted up to receive the heat from the sunset. He manages not to get caught staring but does smile small to himself. It’s comfortable the way she hangs off his arm; as far as she is unlike her brother in a great many respects, she still palpably resembles Hannibal in many understated ways he wouldn’t have been able to identify if not for her receptivity to him now.

He’s observed multiple times now a sampling of the habits the siblings have in common: ways of speaking, of carrying themselves, of raising their chins when they walk and especially when they talk. They also share the same set of prominent cheekbones and fair eyebrows.

As if remembering, she opens her eyes and asks him, “Did they play Ireland yet?”

“Dublin yesterday; Copenhagen tomorrow,” he recites with a nod. There’s a funny glow painting roses into her cheeks. “Why?”

“He and Don have a tradition about Ireland—well, they have one for every country they visit together. Ireland’s my favorite.” The grin on her face is contagious; he can detect it catching in him by increments. “It has to do with Guinness and Irish literature.”

There’s a grin splitting across his face as he asks, “Do I want to know?”

“Hannibal will tell you,” she decides in that light, airy tone she uses for subjects she particularly enjoys. More often than not, anything to do with Nemean Lion earns that tone from her. “He’ll be home in three weeks,” she supplies, beaming.

Measuredly he answers, “Yes, he will.”

Her tiny smirk is as good as a grin from Beverly. It gets his ears burning just the same way. She is about to say something horribly embarrassing, he can _tell,_ so he scrambles to change the subject.

“Abigail wanted me to ask you for a favor.”

That wins him Mischa’s attention completely, though she looks suspicious at first. He goes on, “She was going to ask when we had dinner, but she thought it’d be better to wait a while.”

“What is it?”

“A coworker of mine has a neighbor with kittens. They’re about five weeks old now, I guess. Anyway, I told Abigail, and she’s made it her mission to find homes for the five of them, so if you know anyone interested, it would make her really happy.”

“How many are there for adoption?”

“Four of the five,” he says. “She talked her friend into taking one once they’re old enough, which will be in a few weeks.”

“Three weeks,” Mischa corrects him. He glances up at her, missing her eyes only just before looking away. Deviously, she adds, “When Hannibal comes home.”

“ _Please_ don’t get him a kitten. I would never hear the end of it.”

Her laugh is loud and short, cut off by her hand and a muffled hiccup of a laugh. He shakes his head, laughing, too.

“You know, I think if I had a sister she’d be a lot like you.”

He hadn’t quite meant to say it, but he doesn’t regret that he did. Mischa tilts her head to one side, gives him a soft but critical once-over, every bit as assessing as she is cheerful; every bit as watchful as she is open and gracious.

“What am I like, Mr. Graham?”

“You’re warm, even if there’s something stored down, deeper than I would go digging without your permission, telling you not to be,” he admits softly. Silence would be the worse substitute for truth, and anyway, Mischa deserves nothing less _than_ the truth from him. “You’re every bit the guardian to your brother as he is to you, and I think if you thought I’d done wrong by him you’d rip me to pieces without a second thought.”

There’s a moment where he worries this analysis will offend; that she will receive it badly and protest for the sake of some gentle sense of propriety. It lasts but a moment. It’s all the time the trivial fear merits. She doesn’t deny, draw away from him in horror, or so much as blink. A shadow of a smile ghosts over her lips.

It is gone before he can attribute meaning to the gesture and gone before he can decipher intention or accident from it. She isn’t hiding it from him. Her default is to react in private, like her brother, when she can handle it.

“You are wrong, of course,” she says after a few seconds more of watching him. Her green eyes study him, irises shot through with the golden extravagance of the crepuscular rays from the sun. “I would think long and hard before going after you—and Hannibal wouldn’t want me to, obviously.”

It’s voiced so casually, this latent threat sounding slightly more like reassurance than anything else.

“Thank you for your consideration.” He tips his head, and she curtsies mid-stride.

They are advancing slowly on the parking lot where Will’s Crown Victoria and Mischa’s BMW X1 sit idly side-by-side. The sky is the most astounding dust color near the horizon and blue higher up. It reminds him a bit of sand clinging to pale, luminous sea shells, the wheat-colored granules like pixels he could superimpose over this picture of the sunset. He fiddles his phone out of his back pocket, gets Bixie’s leash secured around his wrist, and snaps a few photos of the sky to show to Hannibal later. He told Will one night his favorite thing about sunsets—because they were a couple that discussed sunsets sometimes, and what of it—was the way the sunlight sometimes filters through the leaves like it reflects on the floor of the ocean but through reverse properties, with shadow instead of with refracted light.

In a soft voice, she tells him, “I will spread the word about these kittens of yours.” Before he can say they aren’t his kittens she goes on: “Was there something else your Abigail has been meaning to ask me?”

This time he has no strong compulsion to correct her, though guilt accompanies the comfort.

“There may have been something else,” he replies vaguely.

Abigail has been meaning to have the tattoo conversation with Mischa since before they were formally introduced, but it hasn’t happened yet for this or that reason. He’s in no hurry to speed up the proceedings, and in case Abigail does change her mind, he wants nothing to do with her ultimate decision. A tattoo is such an intimate thing.

“Well,” she muses in a very musical voice. “You let her know she is free to ask me anything, within reason.”

_She knows about the commission._

_Well, how could she not, really?_

“She knows she is,” he says instead, perfectly fine with the very domestic tone and implication of his acquiescence.

“What a quaint family of artists we make,” she murmurs warmly. “I’m very happy we understand each other, Will.”

And she is, very happy. It’s an observable event emanating off of her and winding up and around his defenses like vines wind up and around stone pillars and fortresses—his pillars, his fortresses. It doesn’t strike him as invasive the way he thinks it would if Hannibal did it so boldly, so directly. Her disposition rejuvenates that which is withered and feeds that which is starved. She offers healing and nourishment where he has been wounded and prodded all his life. The reality sinks in slowly that Hannibal had been, too.

None of that can be said, though there’s a moment where he considers saying it all regardless. He goes with, “Me, too,” reasoning that it relates about the same thing. Maybe when he said his sister would be just like Mischa he meant she’d be just like the three of them altogether: her, Will, and Hannibal.

Will helps Mischa load Bixie and Tianlu into her SUV and gets Bixie’s drool on half his face for his troubles, at which Mischa presses her lips together and very resolutely does not laugh. She gives him a container of wet wipes from the glove box and stands with him outside the car for a moment while he scrubs his cheek and eyebrow, and the sun sets around them. Already crickets are playing and cicadas buzzing in the trees. The sky has surrendered its sandy tint to deeper shades of red and orange. He crumples the used wipe in his hand and snaps another picture, sneaking Mischa’s profile into the frame before she can notice.

Mischa photographs as well as her brother does, even in a candid shot. The sky blazes from behind the cover of trees and silhouettes her almost to the point of complete shadow. He catches her eye and turns the phone in his hand so she can see and smiles at her quiet, airy scoff.

“You’ll be sending that one to my brother.”

“He’ll love it,” Will agrees. There’d be no question of that anyway. “The fifty pictures I took of your dogs, on the other hand, I will be showing to Abigail alone.”

“A good choice,” she laughs. “Although I’m certain he would like some of Tianlu running and jumping about. He’s quite fond of my Tian.”

“I’ll send him the good ones.”

She nods, eyes on the ground and hands overlapping one another behind her back where she’s leaning on the car. The blue tint pervading the horizon more aggressively now makes her look cold and sad, strange. It’s powerful, the pang of dissolution hanging impossibly in between presence and absence. Will detected this deviation from normal behavior in Hannibal, as a learned defense mechanism. He’d done it when confronted with his scar, with the meaning behind his tattoo, with the first mention of his sister.

Hannibal learned it from Mischa, and Mischa does it perfectly by accident.

Abruptly he says, “Let’s have dinner this week.”

Softly she asks, “Yours?”

“Sure.”

“Hannibal will be so very jealous,” she murmurs, sounding pleased. “I’ll be the first to meet your dogs.”

He ducks his head in admission. It hadn’t occurred to him until she pointed it out that Hannibal hadn’t been over yet. They wouldn’t have the chance to orchestrate a visit until he came back for those two weeks in between the Lyon and Minsk shows. Quite unbidden, he remembers his and Hannibal’s first attempt at phone sex nearly a month ago when he said he’d take Hannibal out to dinner for his homecoming.

Mischa catches him blushing, and that’s how they part ways, with her teasing and his speedy retreat.

Will makes it home in time to meet Abigail on her way out the door to meet Marissa in town. It’s not late yet, so he doesn’t object—not that he really would if it were.

He has dinner on the back porch while he’s got the house to himself. The sun’s been down a long time already, so he eats by the light from the kitchen and by the last wisps of sunlight clinging to the teal blue tingeing the sky with dusk. He sends Hannibal the better pictures he snapped today while he was out and about with Mischa. Abigail had encouraged him to take a lot of photos for the communicative element they’d lend for his next discourse with Hannibal.

Among the selected are shots are some from the outdoor café where Mischa treated him to lunch; his favorite from that location being another candid shot, but of him. Mischa had snatched his phone while he was looking off to the side watching the street and mouthing at his straw unsuccessfully. While his vanity begged him not to forward the picture along, his sense of humor told him Hannibal would laugh, and so he’d sent it.

The bulk are from the dog park: one or two of Bixie and Tianlu playing, a few of Tianlu chasing a dragonfly, one of Bixie standing with her front paws on Will’s shoulders, and a few of Mischa with both the Great Dane and the Brittany spaniel watching her for orders.

Last are the final few shots he’d taken of the sunset and the one of Mischa in the parking lot enshrouded in so much sun her visage could only be photographed in darkness.

Will is happy when he sends the pictures. Going through them all chronologically is like living the day over again, and it had been one of his better days. With Hannibal off _serenading the world_ , his weekends had begun to feel tedious and long. He wrote more music since Hannibal had left for Munich than he had in his entire life, and he’d written quite a bit in college.

Abigail had taken to working weekends, occasionally, at the CD store with Marissa. Her hours could be scant, but they typically coincided with Will’s downtime. If he didn’t have to work she probably did, and if she didn’t she might get called in to fill in for somebody else. He couldn’t say he was crazy about the arrangement, but they needed independence from each other, even if it made him feel a terrible kind of lonely most nights after work. She’d picked up on that and hadn’t known what to say to him; he didn’t know how to tell her not to worry about him in a way that she would have believed him.

Mischa is lonely in the same way that he’s lonely—less starved for any blindly given affection than he is for solid connection with another human being. Rare as it is, he recognizes that kindred spark in Mischa, similar to Hannibal’s but wholly unique, unknown, and revitalizing, so he’s incredibly, ridiculously happy when he sends the pictures to Hannibal. Bonding with his boyfriend’s sister could have been a colossal train wreck, and he could scarcely believe his luck that what he got instead was a walk in the dog park.

Dublin is five hours ahead of Wolf Trap, so Will isn’t expecting to see a reply until the morning. He definitely isn’t expecting Hannibal to call him as he’s heading inside with his dishes.

“Will, my love,” he says, voice touching on something delirious and sweet, halfway to a slur and halfway to a hum.

“Let me guess, Guinness?”

“You hit on the nose.” Will hears something that sounds strangely like a hiccup. “You…Guinness, yes.”

“Those _S_ ’s giving you some trouble tonight, babe?”

The endearment comes quite unintentionally, a mere slip of the tongue. Hannibal is obviously drunk, or at least tipsy to the point of acquiring a faint lisp. If he doesn’t want to remember it in the morning, Will won’t remind him. He walks himself to the couch and sprawls out with his feet up and one arm over the side to scratch at whatever pair of ears makes its way under his hand. The boxer Penelope gets there first.

“The pictures were beautiful,” Hannibal says, almost incoherently. There’s agitation brewing just beneath his voice that’s probably a side effect of alcohol consumption.

He thanks Hannibal quietly and tacks on, “They were Abigail’s idea.”

“Abigail,” Hannibal repeats her name fondly. “My sister so loves that girl of yours.” A beat skips, and Hannibal clears his throat. “She is good for you, I think.”

Smiling at the obvious level of concentration it takes Hannibal to find and organize his words Will asks, “Abigail or Mischa?”

“Mischa, my sweet sister,” he says in that same light, airy tone his sister uses to speak about him. He’s forgotten Will’s question entirely. “So strange she isn’t married, darling sister mine. Headstrong—she’s…headstrong like me. I think our father may have been that way. So long, of course, I don’t exactly remember.”

Will stops smiling and sits up. He swallows once, trying to find his voice. Hannibal plows on, unbothered.

“I remember when they died,” he says offhandedly. “One of my more violent memories.”

“Hannibal…”

“It was around that time my arm was broken.”

“Hannibal, don’t.”

“Don’t?”

_Oh, shit, no, no._

That single word, the negation of it; it’s _laden_ with heartbreak, with old grief, and with suffering.

“You’re…” Will sighs. “Please don’t tell me anything now that you wouldn’t like to tell me in the morning.”

Hannibal waits, and Will waits. The front door opens and Abigail comes walking in with two bags of groceries: root beer and vanilla ice cream.

“Yes, of course,” Hannibal says, voice tight and strained in a way that makes Will’s heart beat harder in his chest.

“Hannibal—”

“I should rest, sleep this off.”

Will swallows again around the ache constricting his throat and closes his eyes. He slouches against the back of the couch and lays his forehead against the smooth material. His skin feels much too hot.

“I didn’t mean that I don’t want to know, Hannibal. I want to hear all about, but when you’re ready to tell me.”

“I understand.”

Maybe he does, but all Will can hear is that he sounds halfway asleep already. Whether that’s from the Guinness or exhaustion or home sickness or almost sharing traumatic memories with Will is a far more ambiguous question.

“Goodnight, Will.”

“Goodnight, Hannibal.”

“I love you.”

“I—” Will loses his breath halfway through the syllable, unsure as to what he meant to say in the first place but having no opportunity to rectify the aborted response. Hannibal hangs up.

He closes his eyes and presses his face into the couch again, breathing and concentrating heavily on the cool, pliant fabric beneath his fingers and against his cheek. The way his head is spinning has warmth to it and makes him flush all over, more like distress than it is like happiness. It was too much like crossing lines he had no right to cross, and he’s mortified beyond expression that when Hannibal sobers up he’ll regret nearly telling all to Will before they were ready to do it on their own terms.

Hannibal said he loved him, and Will couldn’t say it back.

 _Who’s dancing around it now,_ a harsh voice in his mind whispers.

A short scraping sound distracts him from the hodgepodge bluster of his confused thoughts. He looks to see a tall, frosty glass housing a root beer float. Abigail pokes a red and white striped straw through the mound of freshly carbonated vanilla ice cream and sits beside him with her own glass in hand.

She says, “Boy troubles?”

He grumbles, “What’s new?”

The look she gives him is fond if a teensy bit longsuffering. He takes a sip of his float; can’t remember the last time he had a root beer float. Probably he had been a teenager.

“Hannibal isn’t usually trouble,” she counters lightly, stirring her straw around in the ice cream.

“No, but I am.”

“Well, then stop making trouble where there isn’t any.”

Her tone, very chipper still, clearly says, _You’re making this harder than it needs to be, Mr. Graham. Stop making it harder than it needs to be._

“Yeah, you’re right, of course, you’re right.” He stirs his float, too, and tips his glass to drink some of the soda by itself. The mingling with the ice cream has made it sweeter, creamier. “I worry too much.”

“Yes, you do.”

He smiles into his glass in spite of himself and the hazy feeling he has that he didn’t handle Hannibal’s half-given confession the way he should have. Abigail is good for him; she doesn’t let him dwell on things that would otherwise break him.

“Will you play tonight?”

“Which?”

She deliberates her options with an expression on her face like she were working out a complex math problem. Her instrument of choice has been the viola more often than not as of late. The novelty apparently ceases to wear off even with time.

“The piano,” she says at last. “Hmm, no, the guitar; yeah, the guitar.”

“You got it.”

They finish off their floats in companionable silence, and Will touches his phone every now and then, nervous. He plays an original piece for Abigail, and while the music helps take the sting off, he feels it still right at the center of him: that unmistakable pain he’d roused out of Hannibal’s voice. He’d done it; no matter how badly he hadn’t wanted to.

For all that he’d hoped to keep Hannibal from revealing anything he’d like to take back after, Hannibal had still said the one thing Will would never _allow_ him to take back.

Hannibal loved him, and there.

It’s a smaller secret, still, than the fate of the Lecter parents and what exactly happened to Hannibal that left him with a scar on the inside of his arm. Even if Will can’t take back the hurt he’d caused, he would still have the conversation, if Hannibal will again consent to it, in person. It’s a small thing, he thinks. It was more a favor than a disservice, he thinks.

 _Tough love,_ he tells himself as he’s brushing his teeth.

And then rolls his eyes.

He looks through his pictures from the day with Mischa again while he’s falling asleep. She’d said they made a quaint family, her, Hannibal, Will, and Abigail. Will had entertained the same idea himself. He’s sure Abigail has; maybe Hannibal, too. It’s so clear to him as he’s setting his phone down on the bedside table and rolling over onto his side that they don’t have any idea what they’re doing. Granted, it scares him less and less as time goes by, but it does scare him all the same. 

If he weren’t afraid, then the stakes wouldn’t matter to him. If the stakes didn’t matter to him, he couldn’t call this love. But he is terrified, and the stakes are higher than they’ve ever been for him before, for any number of reasons that aren’t all to do with him.

Will grabs his phone, types a quick text to Hannibal and sends it.

_Have lots of liquids today. And please call me._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tianlu (Brittany spaniel)  
> http://www.pinterest.com/pin/15621929929830724/
> 
> Bixie (Great Dane)  
> http://www.pinterest.com/pin/46513808623804676/
> 
> Mischa’s dress  
> http://www.verawang.com/EN/fashion/collections/fall-2014/2079-look-10-10


	15. Jump on Top of Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will gets a blast from the past.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _When we first met, we were both so young / We didn’t give a damn, how the clock would run / The time is right, to make some fool of you / ’Cause it’s getting late. What would you like to do?_

Will receives a call from Alana as he’s getting dressed for work. She invites him out for dinner with Zeller, Price, and Katz once they’re free of professional obligations. As a matter of courtesy, he considers it a courtesy anyway, she lets him know his seat had initially been Jack’s when they made the reservations and that he and Bella both cancelled last minute. Apparently Bella had secured the table and didn’t want the rest of the included party to miss out; that party being Alana, Beverly, Jimmy, and Brian.

He doesn’t mind the last minute offer, really; long engagements in social settings tend to rile him up unnecessarily. A sudden arrangement like this one is easier to stomach, just like their outing at La Fin Absolue du Monde had been easier to stomach.

He politely accepts her invitation and scans through Hannibal’s thread for anything new since the night before once the call disconnects. The first day after his drunken almost-confession, Hannibal hadn’t made any attempt to contact him. Yesterday he’d finally acknowledged Will’s long unanswered texts, but he hadn’t ventured yet to return his calls.

It’s an understatement to say Will is concerned.

He’s hoping dinner with everyone will provide him with sufficient enough distraction not to spam Hannibal’s phone with more worried texts. That’s what he’s hoping.

He definitely doesn’t consider calling Mischa, though he doubts she would be critical or even minutely judgmental. Mostly he doesn’t like the thought of Hannibal having to hear it from his sister that Will is confused as to their current situation and why Hannibal is so standoffish after their talk Saturday night.

A text comes in on his phone from Beverly, snapping him out of his daze. Before he can read it, a second one buzzes in.

_Zeller and/or Price are planning on getting very drunk tonight._

_Maybe don’t ask Abigail to come along, unless you wanted to get drunk, too._

A small smirk tugs at his lips. He shakes his head and writes back.

_Tempting but I think she’s busy tonight,._

It’s only a few seconds before she writes him back, sounding every bit the protector he knows her to be: _Am I going to have to kick someone’s ass?_

Abigail knocks on his door as he’s contemplating how to reply. When he calls out that it’s safe and he’s not indecent, she sticks her head into the room and asks if he planned on doing laundry today.

“Have at it,” he says, shaking his head.

“Cool, thanks. Hey, Marissa said she wanted to go see a movie tonight. Did you want me home? I know we haven’t had a proper day off together in a while.”

“Actually,” he announces with no small amount of pride, “I’m going out tonight.”

There’s a flicker of confusion across her face for a moment before cheer replaces it. She laughs and says, “Well, be safe. Remember, I have access to Mr. Zeller’s Facebook page.”

He makes some kind of elegant noise like a chortle.

“How, even?”

“Mutual friends.” She shrugs and casually sweeps into the room. “Hannibal call you yet?”

“Uh, no.” He sits on the edge of his bed, determined not to look as down as he suspects he does. “He texted a bit last night. I think he’s probably busy.”

She doesn’t call his bluff.

“Well, they had a lot to get done Sunday, didn’t they?”

“Oh, yeah, they left Dublin early for Copenhagen, played a show the same day.”

“He’s probably way jetlagged,” she says in a carefree huff, plopping down to sit beside him on the bed. “Not to mention he must have been _so_ hung-over for the flight and probably right up until they played.”

Will smiles ruefully behind his hand and mumbles, “I’m pretty sure I tell you too much about my life.”

Offhandedly she replies, “Well, I don’t pay rent; seems like a fair trade.”

He snorts.

“I was thinking about that actually. Now that I’m making bank,” she begins, doing emphatic things with her eyebrows. “I could help with bills and stuff.”

“You already buy groceries,” he protests.

“That doesn’t count.” She waves her hand at him. “I want to pull my weight.”

“Are you kidding?” He chuckles at the perplexed look on her face. “You cook more than half of my meals; you watch the dogs when I’m not here; you go walking with me if one of them runs off. You do more than enough, Abigail.”

She ruminates on his insistence for a few long seconds before pointing a finger at him.

“I’m paying for the internet. You barely even use it.”

He rolls his eyes when she breezes out of his room to get started on her laundry. He’s just starting to go into the hallway when she calls over her shoulder at him, “It’s non-negotiable.”

On his way out she asks if they need anything from town. He tells her dryer sheets.

Will has classes to teach from eight to twelve and takes a solitary lunch in between them and his afternoon lessons. It’s no fault of his students that he doesn’t attend too much to what’s going on in the meantime. Music gets him through life, and he’s not a bad teacher, but it isn’t all red, shiny apples and perfect tuning. Most of the time it’s staggered apologies for tardiness, sharp flats, flat naturals, and dropped rosin cakes.

The highlight of his day comes when Jack introduces him to a new, especially bright student: a particularly talented flautist named Georgia Madchen. She comes in to meet him at three o’ clock and probably thinks he’s a total space case given that it’s their first lesson together and he zones out every time he calls her by name.

It’s his luck that she’s nice about it and patient; maybe even finds him endearing for his distraction. All he can offer in the way of an honest apology is that he’s coming off extended medical leave, and she humbly accepts it.

After his last scheduled appointment he walks out of the building to meet up with Beverly, Brian, and Jimmy outside the Academy. Brian looks wiped out, and Jimmy looks pensive. Beverly just has her hands in her pockets and her eyes on the sky. Will goes to them, and Jimmy notices him first.

“Hey, Will.”

“Hey.” He looks from him to Brian, remembering Beverly said one of them might be drinking tonight. “You guys carpooling?”

“I’m the designated driver,” Brian announces bitterly.

A very chipper Jimmy Price explains, “Paper covers rock.”

Will smiles small at Beverly. To Brian he says, “Bad luck.”

“Nah, Jimmy cheats.”

“ _How_ do I cheat? It’s not cheating if I can read you like a book.”

Deadpanning, Brian retorts, “That’s vaguely sociopathic, I hope you realize.”

“Eh, what’s a game of even and odd,” Jimmy replies easily, grinning at Will as he steps off the curb and makes for Brian’s car.

Beverly crosses into the parking lot, walking backwards and talking to Will as he walks in her footsteps. She asks him, “What about you? Want to ride shotgun?”

“Yeah, thanks. Did you guys find someone to take Bella’s seat for tonight?”

“Jack’s sending one of his prized directors from the third floor.” She shrugs. “She has business at some law firm in Baltimore today, so he thought we could make the most of the trip and have her along.”

He asks, walking with her to her car, “Do we know her?”

It ends up being Miriam Lass, who he’s met once or twice since he transferred from Arlington. They meet up with her and Alana at Brio Tuscan Grille. Their booth seats six comfortably. Will takes an edge seat across from Beverly with Alana on his left and Jimmy on the other side of her. Brian sits across from him, and Miriam Lass takes the seat in between him and Beverly.

The restaurant is a nice one, a bit on the expensive side, admittedly, but great in terms of atmosphere. Will thinks, with a small smile, that the company’s not bad either.

Jimmy and Brian mostly carry the conversation for the table with Beverly and Miriam interjecting every few exchanges. Apparently the four of them were pretty close friends before Will took the job in Woodbridge. It’s when the food comes and Jimmy starts in on his wine that Alana turns to Will with a soft smile and a gentle elbow to his ribs.

“Not so bad, is it?”

“Jack and Bella are missing out,” he agrees with a small nod of his head.

Across the table Miriam jokes, “It’s a bit like the kids being out on a school night while the parents stay at home.”

“Except _we_ are not on curfew,” Jimmy says cheerfully over his glass.

Brian gives him a dour look, and Will’s phone buzzes in his pocket. His first thought is that Abigail might be checking in after the movie with Marissa, but it keeps buzzing with an incoming call. He apologizes and digs the thing out of his pocket, going to silence it when the photo temporarily blanks his brain.

He hears Alana ask, as if from very far away, “Is that Hannibal?”

“Excuse me,” he stammers, jumping out of his seat and striding for the exit. He answers as he’s shouldering the door open: “Hannibal?”

There’s a brief pause and then Hannibal speaks his name like a question or a prayer. He sounds exhausted, nothing more or less than weariness touching his voice. That he isn’t drunk or at least doesn’t sound intoxicated in the slightest registers as very significant in Will’s mind.

Cautiously Will asks, “Isn’t it late where you are?”

Nemean Lion is presently in Norway, which puts Hannibal five hours ahead of Baltimore. It’s something like two in the morning in Bergen.

“I won’t have a better opportunity to speak with you until we leave for Stuttgart. Recent events have…given us very little free time.”

“Well, what is it? Are you okay?”

“Bedelia’s father passed away this morning,” Hannibal says, a bit haltingly. “I should clarify that there are other reasons prompting me to call you tonight.”

Will looks over his shoulder into the restaurant, regret churning in his stomach.

“I’m sorry about Bedelia’s father. Is she all right?”

“She is in mourning. It has done wonders for her playing, though it is an edge she doesn’t need.”

Will bites his lip, diligently picking his words before he decides to ask, “What else prompted you to call me tonight?”

“I had…thought my behavior the past few days to be unsavory.”

“Why were you so worried about our conversation that night on the phone?” He pockets one hand and leans against the wall, grateful there are no outdoor tables at the entrance of the building. “I didn’t think anything of it until you ignored me the day after.”

Hannibal goes quiet, and for a moment Will panics. A moment is all he is allotted.

Hesitating, Hannibal says, returning to Will’s earlier point, “It’s very late.”

“You said you wouldn’t have time to talk until Stuttgart,” Will reminds him. It would be imprudent to argue Hannibal’s concession when it isn’t a good time for either of them to be on the phone. “When will that be?”

“Sunday,” he answers.

“This Sunday?”

“Yes.” Hannibal sighs. “I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s…I’m actually at dinner now with some colleagues.” Lightly, feeling that Hannibal should laugh or at the very least smile, he adds, “They’re probably gossiping all about our love.”

Hannibal does gift him with a laugh, a very soft chuckle. In the same mumbling tone he gets when he’s falling asleep, he says, “I apologize for intruding on your dinner.”

“No, I’m just glad to hear from you, even if it’s bad news.”

There’s a placid moment of silence between them, and Will relaxes his shoulders against the cool brick of the building. He looks back inside briefly, and his table looks more jocund than confused in his absence. The only penalty he’ll reap for his stepping out will be cooled risotto. He doesn’t mind that either. He’d planned to take it home and eat the rest for lunch the following day.

“I’ll let you get back to your friends, Will.”

“Text me whenever you get a minute.” He takes a breath and adds, “Please. It’s the worst kind of limbo, you being so far away when I can’t talk to you.”

Will can hear Hannibal’s smile when he agrees; can hear the faint undertone of unease when he bids Will goodnight.

He’s not inside ten seconds before he hears an eruption of laughter from his table. He slides back into his seat just as Brian is calming down and looks from Miriam to Beverly for an explanation. They both just shake their heads, the former grinning behind her beer and the latter shaking in silent laughter. Will looks to Alana, blushing red from her neck to her hairline.

Jimmy tells Will, in an innocent voice, “We were just talking about music.”

“I’m sure you were.”

“For the record,” Alana says, still a pretty shade of pink, “I adamantly did not want to have this conversation.”

Frantic, Will asks, “What conversation?”

“Your man candy,” Beverly supplies helpfully.

“What about my—he’s not my man candy.” Will sputters, “Any more than Saul is _your_ man candy.”

“Saul _knows_ he’s my man candy,” Beverly retorts airily. “Just like _Hannibal_ probably knows he’s yours.”

“I’m so sorry, Will,” Alana says in a mortified voice. It occurs to him then that she knows Hannibal, too, and considers him a friend.

“You know what,” he declares to the entirety of the group watching him, “I don’t even want to know.”

He stabs the pancetta with his fork and savagely eats it while Brian and Beverly titter on either side of Miriam Lass. It hasn’t gone so cold that it’s not enjoyable, but he’s way behind the rest of the table, so he doesn’t bother trying to hurry and finish. 

“I met Hannibal Lecter once,” Miriam says in a casual voice once everyone has stopped laughing. She points in Alana’s general direction. “Remember? Jack sent me here for that music conference when I was conducting.”

Will watches Alana’s face to see the recognition.

“Oh, right, that was a few years ago now.”

Miriam turns to Will, a funny kind of gleam in her eyes. She asks him, “Do you know Frederick Chilton?”

Brian squawks out another laugh, more susceptible to it now that he’s been laughing so long and heartily all night. Beverly gets her chin in her hand and gives Will an amused, slightly concerned glance.

“We’ve met,” Will says, hearing and disdaining the mopey chord in his admission.

“Not a fan,” Miriam teases, watching him very laxly from behind her forkful of Mahi-mahi. This is probably the third time they’ve ever spoken, so being under her loose scrutiny like this is a bit jarring, or it would be if she weren’t this slack in her interaction with him. It’s easy to talk to her and engage in this light form of banter. After she sets her fork down and swigs from her bottle, she says, “Chilton followed Hannibal Lecter around like a puppy. It was the funniest thing.”

Alana nods sympathetically when Will shoots a bewildered look her way.

“In his defense, everyone was taken with Hannibal. He showed up unannounced and charmed every person he met.”

The way Alana says Hannibal’s name is familiar; it sounds earned and comfortable, and Will likes it. He wouldn’t want to be the only authority on Hannibal Lecter sitting at this table—not that he considers himself an authority on the man. He doesn’t, at all.

“So what’d Hannibal do?”

Alana looks at him, and he tries to tell if the name sounds the same from his mouth as it does from hers. She gives Miriam a conspiratorial look and flashes a disarming smile at Will. The smile stretches into an innocuous grin, “Well, Chilton basically acted as a walking billboard for Nemean Lion all night. I didn’t know he could talk so much with so little prep time.”

Miriam picks up for her: “Eventually he had to call in his band mates to rescue him. It was sort of adorable.”

“Which ones?” Brian asks, leaning in curiously. His smile has faded, but his eyes gleam brightly.

“Donald Sutcliffe, I think.” Miriam taps her chin thoughtfully with one finger. She turns questioning eyes on Alana. “And Bryn Fuller?”

“Bedelia Du Maurier was there, too, but she was attending the talks in the auditorium.”

Will speaks up. “Abel Gideon wasn’t there?”

“I think he might have been with Du Maurier, at lecture,” Alana replies. “ _You_ weren’t lecturing at that conference? In…2009, I think it was?”

Will’s been to a few conferences, here and in other states. He knows he met Chilton at a conference of all places.

“Was it here?”

Miriam thinks about it for a minute, stealthily sneaking a sweet potato morsel off Brian’s plate while he looks over his shoulder at the door. She says, “Yeah, or it might have been in Washington. Oh! It was in Washington.” She whacks Brian’s arm with the back of her hand, and he whips around to face forward again. “Remember, because I was saying the Washington set-up is never as nice as the one in Baltimore, so we went to Great Falls Park and got drunk.”

Jimmy smiles serenely at the memory, and Brian flushes, pretty attractively if Will says so himself.

Will recalls the Washington conferences he’s attended, and actually, he thinks he was probably at the one they’re talking about. He’s skeptical but more because the possibility that they’re right excites him. He asks, “You’re sure he was at that conference?”

Alana nods and says, “I bet you even met him, probably. He shook a lot of hands, made a lot of acquaintances.”

It was years ago. He could have met Hannibal, could have touched him impersonally, could have scantily made eye contact; could have missed everything that Hannibal has proven himself to be. He searches his mind for the reel containing that information, looks off to the side to call it back to the surface, and vaguely catches sight of Beverly’s fork creeping across the table for his plate.  
 _  
He’s overdressed, not terribly, but enough to be spotted in a crowd by people who know him. None of these people know him._

_Jack Crawford finds him lurking outside the auditorium minutes before he’s scheduled to get onstage and deliver his talk on pitch simultaneity. He greets him warmly, smiling as he gives his name. Will returns the introduction formally, higher strung for being dogged by Chilton since he arrived until some other sparkling persona had distracted him from the chase._

_“My superiors tell me you teach in Arlington,” Crawford says, though Will can’t imagine Jack having any real superiors for this reason or the other. “How’s that going for you?”_

_“I like it,” Will lies. “It’s close to home, now that I have a home.”_

_It’s too much information, but Jack doesn’t seem to think it is. He just nods, peeks behind the curtain separating them from the stage to look into the audience._

_“Are you comfortable in this kind of environment?”_

_“It comes with the territory,” Will says honestly. There’s nothing personal or telling about it. “If the aim is to spread awareness, usually people want to taste some blood before putting down their money for your cause.”_

_“These things turn out bloody in your experience?”_

_Jack Crawford is still smiling. Will’s up for his spiel. He only has time left to say, “Not all money’s gold, and not all bloodshed is murder.”_

_He lectures like he would in a university hall, seeing no great difference between pouring into college students and pouring into donors, connoisseurs, enthusiasts, and whoever else comes to listen._

_It hadn’t been especially important to his experience at the time, but as he’s summoning the smallest details into immaculate acuity, he can see Bedelia Du Maurier sitting near the front with Abel Gideon at her right. It makes sense since she’d attended the other lectures before his. She’s wearing a black, modest dress in the low lit seating area just a foot or so lower than the elevated stage. Abel Gideon is wearing black, too, though his is a more casual look._

_Further in the back, and it takes longer to find them, Will finds Bryn settling in with a man on either side of her: to her left is Donald Sutcliffe and to her right is Hannibal Lecter._

“What an idiot,” he mutters under his breath.

He hears Miriam ask someone, “Does he do that a lot?”

Beverly replies for him, “Oh, pretty much.”

“You weren’t gone for very long,” Alana assures him when he glances her way.

“Well, great.” His face goes warm, and he finishes the last of the roasted chicken on his plate. He stares down at it doubtfully. To Beverly, he says, “How much of my food did you eat?”

“Not even that much,” she protests with a laugh.

He decides not to pursue it and just makes do with what he has. Everyone’s in good spirits, and he has some seriously fascinating memory recall to do when he gets home. His phone buzzes once in his pocket; this time it is Abigail checking in. No one cares that he looks at his phone under the table. Alana does inquire as to how Abigail’s doing, but that’s all the scrutiny anyone cares to place on the subject. He suspects it’s their way of apologizing for teasing him while he was on the phone with Hannibal.

“She’s good. She picked up painting again. We’re pretty happy about that.”

Alana’s smile is fond, soft; Beverly’s, too. It occurs to him that he speaks about Abigail with the same affectionate inflection that he does where Hannibal is concerned. They hear it in his voice and think he’s adorable.

“Who’s Abigail?” Miriam sets her napkin on her plate and sips her beer. “Daughter?”

“Oh, no,” he’s saying at the same time that Beverly tells her yes. He gives her a betrayed expression that mollifies her instantly. Quietly, he says, “I’m not her father.”

“You don’t have to be her father to be her parent,” Beverly replies in a firm but compassionate tone.

He sighs, grateful the minute he realizes that Miriam apparently doesn’t know about the goings-on between him and the Hobbs family. It’s so rare that someone doesn’t already know him these days.

Beverly tosses Will her keys on their way out, and he drives them back to the academy. Brian follows them on the interstate in his car and stays on even after they get off at exit 161 to take Jimmy home _because paper covers rock._

“How’d you like Miriam?”

“She’s likeable,” Will says nodding his head.

Beverly scoffs and asks her question again: “Yeah, but how’d you like her?”

“She’s not like your other friends that I’ve met.”

“No, she’s more down to earth than a lot of people who tend to tolerate Price and Zeller in the same room.”

He chuckles and tells her, “You’re down to earth. Saul’s down to earth.”

Smiling a very secretive kind of smile at him she says, “ _You’re_ not.”

“What?” He gives her an incredulous look. “ _I’m_ not down to earth?”

Still smiling in that very fond way, she says, “You can be very arrogant, Will Graham.”

“I’m…”

There isn’t a defense he has in mind that seems even minutely logical. By all accounts, he isn’t _not_ arrogant, even if he is tamped down, focused, and often immovably stubborn. Well, maybe those things make him more arrogant than not, actually.

“Did we meet at that conference in 2009?”

She shakes her head no.

“The way Jack tells it, though, he’d been trying to recruit you ever since; never had the opportunity until the transfer went through with Arlington.”

He thinks about his encounter with Jack, meeting him for the first time and having the feeling like the man was totally sure of himself. It’s not surprising to find out he was motivated by business; hell no, it isn’t, especially now that Will actually knows Jack.

They separate at the academy so he can pick up his car and go home, and the whole way there he battles intensely with his desire to remember everything that happened at the conference in Washington. He’s curious about whether he did meet Hannibal, but he wants to know whether he’d met anyone else and then forgotten like he met Jack and promptly forgot him.

Maybe there’s something to what Beverly said about arrogance.

Abigail’s painting in the den when he gets home, on a medium sized canvas she’s only just started to transform with her many brushes and colors. There are newspapers all over the floor and clear jars of smog-colored water on trays all along the coffee table she still uses as a seat.

“You didn’t have to wait up for me,” he tells her with a small smile that he can _tell_ radiates affection and has _always_ radiated affection. “I hope you got something to eat in town.”

“We went and got pizza after the movie. Dinner and a bite,” she clarifies with a wink. Will smirks and sets his messenger bag on the end couch cushion. “Your night go okay?”

“Yeah, actually. It was a good time.” He rolls the sentiment around in his mind a moment before adding, “Hannibal called.”

“Oh?” She turns to look at him, green-coated brush in her right hand and orange spots speckled up and down her left arm. Lightly but seriously she says, “I hope he apologized.”

“He did, actually. He said he’d call again on Sunday. There’s been some unexpected trouble outside of the tour, so they’re getting some things sorted in the meantime.”

“What happened?”

“Bedelia Du Maurier’s father passed away. I think they’re probably looking for a replacement drummer to fill in for her when the funeral comes. I don’t know how it’ll affect the tour overall, but it didn’t sound like he really knew what they would be doing. Maybe they’ll cancel the upcoming dates they have scheduled.”

“He could come home then, right? If there’s a funeral, they could be here for something like a week getting it all figured out.”

Her expression is sympathetic but curious. It’s strange to think of Abigail wanting Hannibal to come home early.

“He’s already said he’d be home the first week of October. That’s in, what, two weeks?”

“A little over two weeks,” she corrects him nonchalantly.

“Well, he’s already coming home in a little over two weeks. Whatever they decide to do in the meantime, I just hope it’s in everyone’s best interest and doesn’t cause them too much trouble.”

“It’s already caused Bedelia Du Maurier all the trouble,” Abigail says, turning back to her painting. “All anyone else can do is try to make it easier.”

Will sits finally by his messenger bag and watches her paint familiar lines that turn out, after many, many brushstrokes to resemble an outline of a dog running against a blue and yellow backdrop of sky and autumn-glazed grass. It’s nice watching her paint, like listening to music or meditating is nice. It’s a laidback, unspoken sort of intimacy he never could have initiated in terms of verbal requests or suggestions. It’s something only she could have given him; her art is a gift to be given just like his music is a gift to be given.

He’s torn between staying and sharing in her company and going to bed. The hour is late enough that he could sleep if he tried, but he’d much rather sit a while and watch her work and fine tune the smaller details of the painting. He chooses the middle ground and stays, dreaming and watching at the same time. Where his memory left him he had just left Jack for the stage and had spotted Hannibal in the audience.

It’s nothing at all to sink back into the couch and drift, halfway in between remembering and creating that memory anew.  
 _  
Will talks and talks, and the lecture plays through with no effort from him whatsoever. He uses this time on autopilot to watch Hannibal, in any capacity that his memory has preserved him—in whatever capacity that his creativity fills in the blanks where Hannibal wasn’t in his line of vision._

_He oscillates between Bedelia and Abel, the two appearing quite invested in what he’s saying—he observes with no small amount of pride—and the three latecomers in the back row. Donald mostly has his eyes elsewhere, Bryn alternates between checking her phone and tuning in to the lecture, and Hannibal focuses primarily on Will. He wishes he could say that it’s all memory and nothing to do with his wistful imagination, but really has no idea how much of it is genuine recollection and how much of it is raw evidence._

Will cracks an eye open and checks the status of Abigail’s painting. She’s giving color to the dog now, and if Will had to guess he’d say she was painting Winston. There’s a small, faintly traced curve a ways in front of the dog’s mouth—a Frisbee, in all likelihood.  
 _  
After the speech Will escapes the stage the same way he came in. Bedelia Du Maurier follows after him immediately. There are, apparently, no rules against her going anywhere she damn well pleases._

_She tells him, with a coy, appreciative smirk on her face, not to be so shy; that he’s got quite a way of speaking, though it obviously doesn’t extend necessarily to one-on-one interaction. It’s all she says to him, hovering for a moment, he realizes now, to see if he will recognize her and promptly turn to putty. He doesn’t, so she leaves him be, more satisfied than he had any way to explain at the time._

“Do you think you’ll have Hannibal over for dinner sometime when he comes back in October? Or are you planning on living in Baltimore for those two weeks?” He thinks both of those options sound comical in their own very different ways. Without seeing his smirk, she says, “I think he’d like it here, actually.”

“Yeah? We have five dogs more than he’s used to,” he says in reference to Mischa’s dogs, Bixie and Tianlu. Abigail hums in agreement. “And we don’t usually have guests over apart from Beverly and Alana sometimes, or Marissa.”

“I could cook something up, whip out my culinary skills.” She gives him a playful look and highlights some sunshine on the red flying disk. “You could catch some fish for the occasion, and I could do something fancy with it that he’d like.” She shrugs. “I think it could work.”

“Yeah, it could,” he says, laying his head back on the couch and figuring. “We should probably start planning it now.”

Her laugh soothes him, soothes his nerves.

“Slow your roll. We can talk it over tomorrow.”

She paints a white-gray cloud into the blue sky, and Will’s eyes drift closed. Sitting here has made him tired. He doesn’t plan on falling asleep on the couch, so probably he’ll have to go to bed soon to counteract that outcome.  
 _  
Abel Gideon he doesn’t meet so much as he sees him waltz casually out from behind the curtain, look around for Bedelia, and then follow wordlessly after her once he catches sight of her retreating back. Will waits a few seconds more for someone else, Jack maybe, to reach out to him, but no one does._

_He leaves early, standing outside the front entrance for a while just looking up at the dark sky with his hands shoved deep in his pockets. When the door behind him opens he goes stiff all over, thinking his luck has run out and Chilton has found him again, but the voice calling him is different, polite in a way Frederick Chilton’s voice only feigns to be._

_“Mr. Graham?”_

_It’s unfair that it’s only a memory, imperfect around the edges but pristine for having been away from him for so long. He expected he’d catch sight of Hannibal walking through a crowd or vaguely shaking hands with him and then skipping off to do other, more exciting things than talk to him, but here he is, standing in the darkness with Will and looking gorgeous and crisp and with only the tattoos on his arms and hands exposed beneath the rolled up sleeves. One of the more subtle ones on his left wrist hasn’t been added yet._

_“Yes?”_

_“I wanted to tell you I enjoyed your lecture. It was very informed.”_

_Will sorts the events into a timeline to make sense of them as his remembered self struggles for the right way to say thank you. It goes something like: Chilton follows Will around, Chilton ditches him for Hannibal, Don and Bryn intervene, and the three of them end up at Will’s lecture with the remaining band members._

_“Thank you.”_

_He winces a little, wishing he could have been more eloquent, could have flirted with this man at least a little bit._

_“Do you lecture often?”_

_“Yeah, sometimes they ask me to come up and present something. I’m just a teacher.” He shrugs noncommittally. “All of us have to do it.”_

_“You have a gift for it.”_

_Will rolls his eyes in the memory. Oh, God. He_ is _arrogant._

_“Insofar as I’m useful for the skills I bring to the table, yes.”_

_He’d been lonely that year, dealing with personal demons and strains on the familial ties he had left to his name. Kindness from a stranger would never have been accepted gracefully._

“Maybe you should call it,” Abigail tells him in a soft voice that lilts at the edges with subtle amusement. “I’m off Saturday, unless we’re inexplicably shorthanded that day and they need me to come in.”

He gets himself off the couch without making too many disgruntled noises and ambles off toward the hallway, stopping at the mouth of it to turn and say, “Beverly and Alana say hi, by the way.”

Abigail smiles, and they say goodnight. Will brushes his teeth and dresses down for bed, calling to mind the last pieces of his first encounter with Hannibal in Washington before he lays down to sleep. Sitting on the edge of his bed, he thinks back and closes his eyes again.  
 _  
“I’m sure you are more valuable to your employers than the mere benefits they acquire from your gifts.”_

 _“They aren’t gifts,” Will retorts snidely. He’d spent too much time primed by Chilton’s advances to have any kind of respect for the reassurance of a stranger. He’s so_ rude _it’s a miracle Hannibal doesn’t roll his eyes and leave Will standing here by himself to mourn his actions. “The way I think distinguishes me from them; it makes my approach to the music that much different.”_

_“And it alienates you from them as well.”_

_“Yes, it—” He falters, giving Hannibal a_ look _. “What are you getting at?”_

_“Great creativity often necessitates an element of madness, a wider scope and range of perception.”_

_The tight, clinging uncertainty pinching in Will’s chest isn’t a new contribution. It’s one he experienced in 2009, outside the building of the Washington conference in the cool summer night._

_He asks, “What’s your name?”_

_“Hannibal.”_

_Will nods, and he’s in no shape emotionally to handle this meeting with any kind of aplomb outside of spiteful sarcasm. Unexpected connections aside, he has no patience for it tonight; Chilton has been fumbling at him like a freshman with a panty girdle, and strangers have been schmoozing too much in his personal space, sometimes sincerely, sometimes very disingenuously. He’s had all that he can handle, even if there’s something deeper to this that he can_ feel _he isn’t forcing from his present opinion._

_“Well, Hannibal—” It sounds foreign on his lips; not warm or tender or even minutely kind. “I’ve had a hell of a night, and I’m just…” He laughs, a weary, dark sound, though his next statement, thank all the fucking gods that exist and have ever existed, sounds warmer than anything else he’s said to anyone in this memory so far. “I’m just about worn out with you crazy sons of bitches.”_

_And Hannibal, bless him, doesn’t even look ruffled. He_ smiles _._

_“Worn out with yourself, Mr. Graham?”_

_He cracks a smile, a small one. Hannibal sees it and looks worlds more relaxed for it._

_“Am I ever,” he concedes in a small voice, already backing away. “Have a good night, Hannibal.”_

_“You as well.”_

_He makes it a few paces toward the parking lot when he stops at the sound of Hannibal’s voice. He calls Will by his first name._

_“You spoke very well tonight. I meant that.”_

_Will swallows once, nods his head jerkily. Hannibal’s insistent in a way other people only think they are; he’s consuming in a way people try to be in their most intimate exchanges with each other. It’s a word he couldn’t place back then and can only supply it now because Mischa had told him that’s what Hannibal was._

_Consuming._

_Hannibal’s expression is open when Will looks up at him, open and indulgent and inviting. Will swallows again._

_“I mean it when I say thank you.”_

_Innocently, he asks, “You didn’t before?”_

_“No,” Will answers bluntly, receiving a beautiful laugh from Hannibal in return. It’s small, gentle. “I was just trying to make you leave me alone.”_

_“Are you still?”_

_Will is, a little bit, but not in the same way that he was._

_He says, “I’ve really had a rough night.” After a thoughtful pause wherein Hannibal just watches him he adds, “I can’t give you anything. Whatever you’re looking for out here with me, I’m not…where I’m at right now is not conducive to relationships or not-relationships or…”_

_And for the first time Will actually looks at Hannibal. He doesn’t look disappointed or hopeful or confused or insulted. He just looks, and he’s heartbreakingly lovely in the moonlight, and Will could never have said that to him then; maybe couldn’t have even entertained that thought given where he was when they met._

_“Neither am I, I’ve been told,” Hannibal says softly._

_It’s confusing that he’d say that, really; but Will can’t be too hard on him when he’s been making excuses for himself through the whole ordeal. It wouldn’t be fair to take what he says for full, lasting face value. They stare at each other for a long time, absorbing and assessing and deciding. Will sounds breathless when he finally speaks._

_“It was nice to meet you, Hannibal.”_

_“Likewise, Will.”_

_Hannibal says his name like he’s spoken it all his life, like they’ve been friends or even lovers for years. Will might be projecting, but he tells himself he isn’t because the chill that runs down his spine when Hannibal speaks it feels genuine and not like a present day reaction superimposed over an old memory. It feels like the first time in a bigger way than everything with Hannibal feels like the first time._

_Will turns to go, and Hannibal doesn’t stop him._

He’s lying flat when his eyes drift open, and the clock reads two in the morning when he turns to look at it. Zombie-like in his movements he reaches for his phone, types a very typo-laden text as he’s crawling into a more comfortable position on the mattress, and nudges Fenris off the bed while he goes back to edit the mistakes peppering every other word in the message.

_We met for the first time at a conference in Washington four years ago. I was kind of a jerk and didn’t recognize you. Do you remember?_

It’s all he can do to send it before he falls back asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ‘Even and odd’ is a reference to “The Purloined Letter” by Edgar Allan Poe  
> Here’s a quote from the text: “When I wish to find out how wise, or how stupid, or how good, or how wicked is any one, or what are his thoughts at the moment, I fashion the expression of my face, as accurately as possible, in accordance with the expression of his, and then wait to see what thoughts or sentiments arise in my mind or heart, as if to match or correspond with the expression.”  
> http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper/poe/purloine.html
> 
> Brio Tuscan Grille  
> http://www.brioitalian.com/dinner-at-the_vistas_at_park_meadows.html
> 
> From Thomas Harris’ _Red Dragon_ : “I’m just about worn out with you crazy sons of bitches.”
> 
> Also from _Red Dragon_ : “Fumbles at your head like a freshman pulling at a panty girdle.”


	16. Yesterday’s Papers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The band copes with a death in the family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Living a life of constant change / Every day means the turn of a page / Yesterday’s papers are such bad news / Same thing applies to me and you / Who wants yesterday’s papers_

Hannibal jolts awake when his phone buzzes in his hand. Thankfully it doesn’t wake Bedelia where she’s sprawled across his torso, asleep and looking more peaceful than he’s seen her since her mother called the previous day. He sighs and blearily checks his phone, careful not to jostle Donald where he’s asleep and—Hannibal checks to confirm—drooling on his shoulder.

The message on his phone is from Will. His first instinct is to frown only because it’s something like two in the morning in Will’s time zone. Hannibal’s second instinct is to frown because it’s seven AM in his own time zone, and he very much cannot get out of bed. He does have an arm free, though, so he can at least look at Will’s message and feasibly reply without waking anyone up.

It reads: _**We met for the first time at a conference in Washington four years ago. I was kind of a jerk and didn’t recognize you. Do you remember?**_

Hannibal lays his head back down, keeps the arm holding his phone upright with the screen hovering a few inches above his face. He closes his eyes, brings his wrist down to scrub at his forehead.

Someone behind him shuffles and makes a noise. He takes his hand away and looks to see Abel beginning to sit up and rubbing at the back of his neck with a disgruntled expression on his face. It dawns on Hannibal immediately that he fell asleep on Abel’s stomach and he is one of two bodies blocking Abel’s escape from the bed.

Abel sees Hannibal watching him, quickly assesses the dog pile they apparently fell into late last night, and then carefully insinuates his way out of the mess of limbs tied up with his, specifically Bryn’s legs tangled up in his where she’s stretched out across the end of the bed with her calves currently blanketing his shins. 

Donald snuffles into Hannibal’s shirt when Abel slips out from under his head, causing his shoulder to bump Donald’s cheek. He wraps an unconscious arm around Hannibal’s waist, causing his knuckles to brush Bedelia’s back where she’s curled into a ball facing away from Hannibal with her ankles resting on Bryn’s stomach.

He has no idea how they ended up this way, but he’s fascinated. He hands his phone to Abel once he’s successfully ambled onto solid ground; the camera is all queued up for a picture. Abel grins and snaps a few from various angles before tucking it back safely into Hannibal’s hand. Hannibal watches him trot off toward the bathroom with mournful eyes. He doesn’t have the heart to wake Bedelia where she’s anchoring him to the bed from his left shoulder to his hip. That arm is stony and tingly, and the best he can do to remedy the stinging feeling is to wiggle his fingers where they’re crushed beneath her ribs.

Hannibal decides to worry about it later and closes his eyes, finding it easier not to blink awake after Abel tends to the curtains upon coming back from the bathroom. He crawls right back into bed where he got out, tucking himself under Hannibal’s head like a pillow and insinuating his legs back into Bryn’s. Donald rolls away from Hannibal’s shoulder and nestles into the curve of Abel’s neck.

Abel scoffs and rolls his eyes fondly when Hannibal arches his neck back to glance up at the face he makes. Through a very impressive feat of contortionism Hannibal snaps two pictures of Donald nuzzling Abel in his sleep. The first one is blurry; the second one is perfect. He sends it to Abel’s number and then to Donald’s. Abel’s phone is silent or off; Donald’s chimes once from a far corner in the room somewhere near the door.

The daylight filters into the room dark orange. It’s peaceful. Something about it is golden, sort of honey-tinted and soft and coaxing. Hannibal turns onto his left side and drops his phone somewhere behind him in favor of curling that arm around Bedelia’s waist and tucking his chin over her shoulder.

The next time he opens his eyes Bedelia has an arm wrapped around him, too. Her face is buried in his shirt and Bryn is curled around her back, body oriented the right way so that her forehead can rest in between Bedelia’s shoulder blades. Hannibal leans back a bit to catalogue his surroundings. There’s an elbow digging into his back that probably belongs to Donald. A proper pillow has been placed beneath Hannibal’s head. Bryn and Bedelia share a separate one.

Hannibal calls gently, so as not to wake anyone, “Abel?”

His eyes jump toward the light padding of feet on carpeted flooring. Abel’s in his bathrobe with pajama pants poking out from the ends of fluffy white material. It makes him look like a frowning cotton ball, or a rabbit perhaps.

“You look like a rabbit,” Hannibal rasps in a muted whisper.

“You look like a rock star,” Abel jokes, smirking. He adds, chuckling, “Two beautiful women on your left and a questionably attractive guitarist on your right.”

Hannibal sighs, tries to stretch his shoulders without waking Bedelia.

“Have you ordered room service?”

“Ten minutes ago I did. I figured more of you would be up by now.” He strolls behind where Hannibal can see and then comes back into view. “Omelet okay for you?”

“I’ll eat anything,” Hannibal mumbles, dropping his face wearily into the pillow beneath his cheek.

“I second that,” Bryn groans from the other side of their sleeping Bedelia Du Maurier. “Did you ask for orange juice, Abel?”

“Yes, I did, pet.”

Bedelia shifts against Hannibal, waking, unfortunately, but probably for the best. It’ll be good for them to get some breakfast in her stomach. She hadn’t been easy about accepting dinner the evening previous, and no matter what anyone thinks about Bedelia, she has a healthy appetite—one to rival Mischa’s. If she isn’t eating, it’s a big deal.

Hannibal’s grateful they don’t have a show tonight. They’ll spend the day in Oslo, getting their feet back under them. Naturally they’ll miss the show in Stockholm on Friday in order to attend the funeral, but Bedelia hasn’t decided yet what he wants to do for herself. They haven’t talked about hiring a replacement drummer for whatever dates they have remaining before the two-week break in between Lyon and Minsk.

The elbow in Hannibal’s back nudges him and then eases, earning a grumbled expletive from Hannibal in the process. Donald yawns noisily behind him before turning and throwing his arm around Hannibal’s side.

“Morning, hot stuff.”

“So help me, Donald,” Hannibal starts to say.

“You’re never going to hear the end of that one,” Bedelia finishes for him.

Hannibal looks, and he can sense all the other three perking up and tuning in, too. They’re careful around her now, but not in the sense that they would think to treat her like glass. They’re careful in that they all know every move each other makes as they’re making it. They’re poised, suspended in an unbroken moment of resurgent anticipation. Each of them dares the universe to hurt Bedelia again, promising that there will be hell to pay in the event that something else should come her way. They’re a passionate, mildly obsessive bunch of people, and when one of them is in pain, they all feel it. Mischa’s a part of their tightly knit group, too. Sometimes she’s their nucleus, and sometimes she’s the adhesive holding them together.

Right now she’s a voice on Bedelia’s answering machine saying simple, loving things, sometimes sliding into Lithuanian and occasionally into less polished, but perfectly passable French because she knows it’s Bedelia’s language of choice.

Bedelia wrinkles her nose and rubs at her eyes before blinking them open. They’re clear and blue when they look back at Hannibal, though her lids are swollen and the tops her cheeks are puffy and stained red with abuse. She swallows once and starts to sit up. Hannibal helps her, though Donald still has an arm secured around his waist and Hannibal can’t feel his left arm. It makes Bedelia laugh, his predicament, so he laughs, too.

Donald gets off him and lumbers off the bed once Bedelia is sitting upright and Bryn is following her example. Hannibal stays where he is sprawled on his back, slowly retrieving the sensation in his fingers.

Bedelia yawns, “What’s for breakfast?”

“Oh, eggs, mostly,” Abel says, sitting on the edge of the mattress by Hannibal’s head and drawing his hand into his lap to knead the life back into it. Hannibal winces when he starts to get pins and needles again.

“What he means to say,” Donald announces, striding back into the room. “Is any old thing you want, Deely.”

“I want you not to call me Deely,” she intones, a small, resilient smirk residing on her lips.

Donald grins and sweeps over, all grand gestures somewhat impeded by his having just woken up. He drops a kiss to her hairline, setting one intimate hand on the back of her head.

“Not a chance, Deely, baby.”

There’s a knock on the door, and Donald goes to answer it while Abel continues to work at Hannibal’s palm. Bryn busies herself with Bedelia’s shoulders. She yawns and says, “It probably wasn’t the best idea we ever had for all five of us to sleep in one bed.”

Abel smirks and looks up from Hannibal’s hand to meet Bryn’s eyes over Bedelia’s shoulder.

“Oh, I don’t know. Some _beautiful_ pictures came of it.”

Bryn’s grin is wicked and pleased. Bedelia’s raised eyebrow is an unspoken comfort. Abel looks down at Hannibal and twitches his eyebrows once, an invitation to share the news himself. Donald parades back into the room before Hannibal can do it, though it’s basically agreed upon between him and Abel that he will be the one to show the pictures.

They eat breakfast from various perches around the room. Bedelia, Bryn, and Donald sit on the bed with their legs folded under them while Abel and Hannibal take up a spot by the window that doesn’t open. It’s a bit tricky navigating through the discarded shoes and heaps of mismatched clothing, but they manage not to trip or drop their breakfast. Abel has a cheese Danish and an entire plate of hash browns. Hannibal has strawberry crepes and succeeds in stealing three strips of bacon off Abel’s plate before his hand is slapped away.

The five of them are quiet as they eat. There’s a bit of noise when Donald gets syrup from his pancakes on the bed and Bryn tucks a blueberry into his shirt, but they are predominantly silent and companionably so.

Hannibal feels for his phone halfway through his breakfast and realizes belatedly that his current outfit does not feature pockets. He looks over his shoulder at the bed and sees his phone lying unobtrusively halfway in between Bryn and Bedelia folded up knees.

To no one in particular, he asks, “Were we at a conference in Washington in 2009?”

A beat of silence flickers by, and then another. Abel taps his chin with one finger, remembering. Hannibal looks around at everyone else still eating and quietly considering his question.

Smoothly, Bedelia answers him, “We were.”

“You remember?” Hannibal turns to give her his full attention. She returns his gaze and nods leisurely. “What else can you recall from that night?”

She shrugs, and he tells himself not to be disappointed if she can’t tell him much else about it apart from the fact of their attendance. It wouldn’t be fair. He himself doesn’t remember going.

“Bryn dressed Abel all in black so he’d look like Johnny Cash, and at least half a dozen women tried to take him home.”

Bryn laughs into her hand. Abel rolls his eyes.

“I got stuck sitting through lecture after lecture so they’d let up,” Abel mumbles. Hannibal can tell by the faint grimace on his face that Abel didn’t enjoy the attention, and actually, it helps to provide context. “You should see the way a woman pales and turns right around when Bedelia’s giving them her trademark eagle eye.”

“I don’t have a trademark eagle eye,” Bedelia protests, to the immediate contestation of Donald, Abel, and Bryn.

She gives Hannibal a look as if to warn him not to agree with them, and before he can say anything, Donald breaks out with, “That’s it! That’s it right there.”

Redirecting, she asks Hannibal, “Why are you asking about a conference from four years ago?”

He drops his eyes and pokes at his crepes with a fork. Abel nudges his ankle with his foot, an intrigued, vaguely conspiratorial look on his face.

“Will is convinced it’s where we first met.”

“You don’t remember,” Donald concludes, laughing but looking strangely sympathetic. It’s the tone and demeanor he assumes anytime he’s about to suggest excessive drinking as a coping mechanism. “Well, is he right?”

Hannibal looks to Bedelia, trusting her to know more about it than he does.

Bedelia frowns, the kind that denotes contemplation, and thinks aloud: “He’s a teacher, right?”

“Yes.”

“Was he lecturing that night?”

“I don’t know,” Hannibal admits.

“Oh, Hannibal,” she sighs, rooting around under her leg for his phone and tossing it to him. “Ask him how it happened.”

He goes to the text Will sent him, a long time ago now, and types out a rephrasing of Bedelia’s question: **Were you lecturing at that conference?**

Bryn’s laugh brings Hannibal out of his thoughts, and when he looks at her she says, “I just remembered that’s where you met Frederick Chilton.”

Donald cracks a smile at the memory, answering in Hannibal’s place: “I liked him. Poor guy was hilarious.”

“Not that he meant to be,” Abel murmurs, spearing a strawberry off Hannibal’s plate and promptly eating it.

Hannibal’s phone buzzes.

**_Yes, on pitch simultaneity._ **

The naming of the topic feels like it might be forgotten information, but Hannibal tries it anyway, having nowhere else to go. He turns to Bedelia and says, “Do you recall a lecture on pitch simultaneity?”

Abel looks up from his second forkful of pilfered strawberries and tilts his head.

“ _That’s_ your music teacher?”

“Well, I suppose we shouldn’t be too surprised, Abel,” Bedelia muses, eyes fixed on Hannibal, a funny kind of warmth stirring there that he isn’t entirely used to. “Hannibal’s always had very high standards.”

Donald laughs. Bryn snorts.

Hannibal gives them each an exasperated glare.

“Oh, come on, Hannibal,” Bryn chuckles, pausing to swig her very large glass of apple juice. “You dated that one Manson, Miser guy, and he was a creep.”

“It was Mason,” Donald corrects her with a snap of his fingers. “And let’s not forget about everyone’s _favorite_ ex of yours.” He looks around for a general consensus before they all speak the same name in one voice: “Jame.”

“Jame was a very sensitive man,” Hannibal defends, trying and failing, he thinks, for a detached tone of voice.

“He was obsessed with hawk moths,” Bryn says offhandedly, “I think he even carried them around in his pockets.”

Indignantly Hannibal retorts, “He never carried insects on his person out of doors.”

Donald perks up, asks, “But he definitely handled them indoors?”

Hannibal sets his phone down on the makeshift table with a loud, short thump. Abel mediates, holding up his hands and flicking his wrists once as if to say, _Enough of this._

After a slightly uncomfortable, drawn out silence, Bedelia speaks up again. Her tone is casual, as if the previous spat hadn’t even happened, and he supposes it may not have registered in her mind as anything to be overly concerned about. She asks, “Do you have a photo of Will Graham apart from the one you set as his caller ID?”

He accesses his photo gallery, knowing immediately which picture he wants. It’s in the _All downloads_ folder, from Will’s outing with Mischa. Hannibal flips through the small treasure trove and lands on the image he wants: Mischa’s Bixie standing on hind legs with front paws mounted on Will’s shoulders. He smiles small at the photo for a moment before passing the phone off to Bedelia.

She looks for all of two seconds before remarking, “A dog lover.”

“I bet your sister’s crazy about him,” Donald says, smirking into his orange juice before settling it down carefully on the floor.

Hannibal replies, easily, “She is, yes.”

That admission earns him a glance from every pair of eyes in the room. He wears a stunned expression that is only genuinely confused for a handful of seconds before understanding seeps in and he rolls his eyes.

“I do not have bad taste in men.”

Bryn guffaws. Donald makes a noise like a gleeful titter. He says at the tail end of his laughter, “I’m so glad I’m not the focus of this conversation for once.”

Bedelia waves her hand, drawing their attention again. She turns the phone so Abel can see the screen. He squints, head still tilted to one side. He shakes his head and shrugs. Bedelia frowns, studying the photo a moment longer before handing the device off to Bryn when she beckons for it with her hands.

“I know we attended that lecture,” she murmurs.

“Must have been something if you remember it after all this time,” Donald says with a shrug, playing at indifference.

“It was. His lecturing style was some odd cross between a scientific approach and a poetic one.” She gestures at Abel for him to remember, which he does. “Remember the way he incorporated the law of the octave into modern studies of chromesthesia?” 

“All his visual aids were of these really abstract murals and obscure street photography taken from various countries. At first I thought he was playing a practical joke, but he was actually just that radical.”

Bryn straightens up and bats Donald’s arm, face lighting up.

“ _We_ were at that lecture, too, I think. Remember, we were just stealing Hannibal away from Chilton and we snuck into that lecture with the Osamu Kanemura up on the projection, and _you_ said—” she points at Hannibal, changing her voice to sound comically like his, “ _This is a mind overcome by an irrepressible drive for artistic creation_.” 

Donald laughs and points his finger at Hannibal, saying, “You _did_ say that. I _remember_.”

“What’s funny about my observation?” Hannibal sniffs, “Clearly I was right.”

“Oh, my God,” Donald chortles, “he doesn’t know what he sounds like to the rest of us.”

Bedelia and Bryn take turns thumping Donald with their hands, gentle gestures meant to ease tension. Hannibal crosses his arms over his chest.

“Will likes the way I talk to him.”

Abel surprises everyone by laughing, loudly.

“Did you get over your fear then?”

Things were much easier when they were in solemn mourning mode and no one was laughing at Hannibal’s expense. He wouldn’t trade it, though. Bedelia’s wide, if reserved, smile is happy. If he looks past the incessant ribbing, what his band mates have essentially done is compliment Will’s intelligence and ingenuity. They had, after all, remembered him after four years.

Hannibal still couldn’t.

He leans over and extracts his phone from Bryn’s lap and goes into his text messages, types: **What did I say to you?**

“Really?” Abel gives him a disbelieving look. “You’re drawing a blank?”

“He hasn’t given me any more details than the fact of his lecture and of our meeting.”

His phone buzzes in his hand.

_**Great creativity often necessitates an element of madness, a wider scope and range of perception.** _

Hannibal stares at the words on the screen, positive that they’re his and not doubting for a moment that he said them to Will. It starts to shimmer, like an image on water, settling in the receding ripples.

_What’s your name?_

_Hannibal._

“Hannibal?”

“What?”

He blinks. All eyes are on him. Donald is going around collecting plates and utensils. When Hannibal looks at him he winks.

“Your thinking face is adorable, hot stuff.”

“ _Donald,_ ” he warns, but his phone buzzes again.

It’s his sister.

_**Has a date been decided for the funeral?** _

His expression softens, and he types back: **Saturday morning.**

To Will he sends, **I seem to recall you called me a crazy son of a bitch.**

Bryn has started up a quiet conversation with Abel to fill in the silence around them. In the meantime, Will is quick to reply.

**_You called me one._ **

Hannibal smiles.

**The rest of the band remembers you, much more clearly than I did at first.**

**_So what’s the verdict?_ **

**You’ve made quite an impression.**

Hannibal waits, finger idling over the keyboard. He looks up at his friends in the room with him, at Abel in his bathrobe and pajama bottoms and Bedelia in an overlarge t-shirt and Bryn in one of Abel’s button-up shirts, and Don in a threadbare sweatshirt. It’s quaintly domestic, what their relationship has become over the years. They wear each other’s clothes, eat off each other’s plates; occasionally Donald will sit on one of them, usually Abel.

He types, **We will be home late tomorrow in preparation for the funeral on Saturday.**

Hannibal moves from his spot by the window to lay down in between Bryn and Bedelia where they’re sitting on the bed. Bedelia shifts down and folds her arms over his stomach, body curled around his side, and rests, closing her eyes. He holds his phone to his chest with one hand and drops his other to comb his fingers through her hair.

Donald returns from his detour in the kitchen and takes up his guitar. It’s where he left it propped up in the one uncluttered corner of the room. He takes Hannibal’s spot by the window and plays aimlessly the way he does on flights and in parks. Bryn lies down next to Hannibal, opening up a webpage on her phone and reading what looks to be an online newspaper article.

His phone buzzes. Will’s asking how long they’ll be in town.

**Until Sunday. We leave Monday afternoon for Stuttgart.**

Will replies, _**One of those days we’re going to wake up together, properly.**_

Hannibal smiles, and Donald plays in the background, crooning some wordless melody.

Will adds, _**I need a picture of you sleeping on my phone. To compete.**_

**I had no idea you were a competitive man, Will Graham.**

**_Well, you’ve got time to figure out the bits of me you don’t know yet._ **

Hannibal closes his eyes, sets his phone down again over his collarbone. He drums his fingers against it gently in time with Donald’s playing, laughs when he can pick out the melody and decipher the tune from it. Donald’s singing the words, too, now, though they’re soft. The lyrics are more suggestions of words than anything else, but Hannibal knows them and so he can hear them.

“I want a Sunday kind of love, a love to last past Saturday night…And I’d like to know it’s more than love at first sight. I want a Sunday kind of love.”

Hannibal takes up his phone again, glancing down when Bedelia bunches her fingers up against Hannibal’s stomach, disturbing the thin material of his shirt.

**I look forward to it.**

“I want a love that’s on the square; can’t seem to find somebody—someone to care, and I’m on a lonely road that leads to nowhere. I need a Sunday kind of love.”

He feels before he sees Bedelia crying silently into his shirt. Her fingers curl into a trembling fist against his stomach. His hand tracks down to hold hers, and gradually the tremor desists, though the tears do not. Hannibal can hear it in Don’s voice, in the slight waver, when he notices Bedelia’s state, though he carries on as if he doesn’t. Hannibal sets his phone down on his chest again and wraps that freed arm around her back.

They spend the day like that, alternating between lounging in bed and passing Donald’s guitar around when his repertoire of lazy songs dwindles. Donald shows Bryn how to play “Fool in the Rain,” and she teaches him to play “Careless Love.” The tint of the sunlight filtering in through the opened curtains changes with the aging morning and the coming afternoon. Anytime Hannibal has his hands free he texts Will. The topic of their first meeting resurfaces time and again.

Will tells him at one exchange sometime in between noon and three, **_You looked so good that night_**.

Hannibal’s moved to the spacious kitchen by the time, standing with Bryn while she’s making tea. She catches him smiling at his phone and rolls her eyes, a smirk on her own face.

**How do you remember it so well? Everyone else recalled you before I did.**

**_I really was kind of a jerk to you. I’m surprised you liked me._ **

Hannibal bites his lip, types: **Do you know that I liked you?**

**_You did, Hannibal._ **

Bryn elbows him gently when he laughs.

“Help me with the tea, you beautiful idiot.”

He does, tucking his phone into his back pocket as he goes. When he’s sitting with his Bewley’s next to Donald on the coffee table he looks through the photo album compiled of photos from Will and Mischa’s day out with her dogs. Since that night that he’d received them in Dublin, Will had sent a more comprehensive bunch of photos. Mischa had provided commentary for over half of them.

Donald’s looking over his shoulder at the photos, and Hannibal isn’t shy. It wouldn’t make sense to be after he spent the entire morning and much of the afternoon enduring their jokes.

“Photographs well, doesn’t he?”

“Yes, I think so,” Hannibal murmurs, smiling.

“Mischa, too,” he teases. Hannibal flicks his ear. He laughs and Hannibal flicks him again. “She takes after brother.”

“Don, come play music for me,” Bryn calls from the seat by the window.

“My muse awaits,” he shrieks, when Hannibal kicks his retreating rear.

Hannibal opens Will’s text again, stares at the words, so boldly uttered and so firmly Will’s that a slight, very slight shiver tickles at his spine. 

**It doesn’t surprise me at all.**

**_Can I call you?_ **

Hannibal quietly lets himself out of Bedelia’s room and traverses the hall to his own room, empty and untouched since check-in. He sits on his bed, brings his feet up beneath him, and presses _Call._

“Hey,” Will answers in a relaxed, low voice.

“Hello.”

“Okay?”

Hannibal blinks down at his lap, squeezes his leg gently with one hand. He takes a slow breath in.

“Yes,” he says, and it’s true.

“It’s been a long day.”

The statement covers them both; it’s a blanket, warm and of exactly the right size and consistency.

“It has been,” Hannibal concedes softly.

He’s smiled a lot today and laughed more than he thought he would, but he remembers the kind of grief he experienced years after his parents’ deaths. It’s fresh still like a wound never properly healed. He’d gone from blank to carefree to destroyed to destructive. He’d bounced all up and down the spectrum, stayed within some ranges a few minutes of his life and then existed in others for months at a time. That had been his experience—a childhood that came and went.

And he’d woken up out of his stupor because there, next to him, younger than he and learning from his mistakes, was his sister. She’d been right there, and his aunt had tucked a shakuhachi in his hands and told him, _Play until it doesn’t hurt anymore._

And he had played through the night into the morning, until he fell asleep with the end-blown flute clutched to his chest in one hand. His other hand had held his sister’s tiny wrist, devoutly as if she were his entire world and desperately because she was so small. His parents hadn’t been small when they died. They had been big. They had been strong, sturdy, everything Hannibal and Mischa weren’t.

Everything that brittle shakuhachi had seemed not to be that first night he played it. And it had saved his life while there was still something left in him to save—when there existed something, some _one_ that could pull him away from the permanence of shadows and chaos.

_It was the way out of silence for Hannibal in his youth,_ his uncle had told Will.

Music was the way; Mischa was the way. He’d nearly missed one and lost the other forever. He doesn’t know where he would be if either of those things had come to pass. Mischa _is_ here, with him along with Oba and Uncle Robertus. Bedelia and Abel and Bryn and Donald are here. Will is here, and Abigail, too.

He asks, because he can’t tolerate the thoughts he entertains in the silence any longer, “What did I look like to you that night?”

Will hums and says, “Like you had me all figured out.”

Although unable to retrieve the complete memory for the life of him, he stills replies with, “I didn’t.”

“No,” Will agrees gently, probably shaking his head. “But I was curious about what made you think you did.”

“Your lecture was very specific,” he recalls, at least having recovered the highlights from the others.

The slides are burned into his mind now, like still-frames captured from a larger reel of waxy film. Even following Will outside into the nighttime air, the scene has resurfaced from his well of memories like a gorgeous, blurry fresco. It’s reminiscent of Abigail’s painting, the aptly named _Lecter Castle._ Hannibal doesn’t trust himself or the memories he finds. He’s biased. He’s incredibly, undeniably biased.

“How do you mean?”

“Bryn informed me that I said you had a mind overcome by an irrepressible drive for artistic creation.”

Will laughs. “You said it like that?”

“I wasn’t wrong,” Hannibal retorts coolly, refusing to cross his arms and object to the second jab at his way with words. “I believe my analysis holds true today.”

“Well, I’m working on it,” Will replies lightly.

He’s not bothered in any way that Hannibal can tell just by listening. Sometime tomorrow he’ll be able to do more than just listen. His hands rub fruitlessly along the tops of his thighs, impatient and agitated.

“Some would argue there is nothing to work on,” he says after a heavy pause.

Gently, as if he were telling Hannibal a bedtime story, and perhaps he may as well be, “They don’t know what the first half of your analysis feels like.”

_It was nice to meet you, Hannibal._

_Likewise, Will._

The words, “I know,” tumble gracelessly from Hannibal’s lips.

“Yeah, you do,” Will allows him, casting them delicately into the quiet again.

Hannibal starts to hug his arms around himself, stops when he catches himself tracing his scar with an unsteady finger.

“I can’t wait to see you,” he says because it’s the truth.

“I’ll be right here,” Will assures him. With the suggestion of a smile peppering his voice, he adds, “I’ll be waiting to steal you away.”

Hannibal tries to smile, but he’s trembling. His eyes are pricking with mad, insensate tears. He drops his chin to his chest and hums. It suffices for an answer, though Will detects his emotion. Hannibal’s glad he does, though he’s equally mortified.

With so much mercy and compassion, Will whispers, “It’s okay, Hannibal.”

And because Hannibal is apparently excellent at telephone conversations, he nods, perfectly silent and holding his breath so as not to make an unfavorable noise like a squeak or a poorly chosen word.

Like, say, love.

“Abigail wants you over for dinner sometime, at ours,” Will says, tone still soft albeit conversational. It isn’t quite casual, but Hannibal’s grateful for the change in subject. “I think she’s planning on throwing something together for you and probably going out of her way to embarrass me. She’s got a few Percocet stories saved up for just such an occasion.”

“It’s no wonder at all she and my sister get along so well.”

“It really isn’t, no.”

Hannibal sighs.

“Has she decided on a tattoo design?”

“Oh,” Will mumbles, rolling the sounds that comprise the utterance around in his mouth. Hannibal looks out the window at the sun hanging at pleasantly brilliant coordinates in the blue mass that is the sky. It’s a good day, warm and with a slight chill in the breeze. Will says, in a meandering sort of way, “I think she’s looking into osprey symbolism right now.”

“An aerial predator,” Hannibal states, recalling that Will told him Abigail hunted with her father.

Will modifies from his claim, “They fish.”

Hannibal smiles.

“Like you.”

Will makes a noise like a pleased scoff, but he doesn’t deny it.

“Is Bedelia okay?”

“She oscillates.”

“I know a bit about that,” Will mumbles, hesitating before he continues, sounding unsure for the first time, “You were going to tell me before, about what happened to you.”

“Yes?”

“If you…I mean, if you haven’t changed your mind about it, we could…it’s just I know that something like this can be a trigger—a scary one, if you’ve had something traumatic happen, and if I can I want to help in whatever capacity you’ll have me.”

Hannibal does smile now but out of confusion.

“Do you mean to suggest that I tell you about my parents, Will?”

“Yeah.”

Hannibal ruminates, honestly, critically, generously, and then gratefully. He only says, “All right.”

Will hears it all, hears everything Hannibal doesn’t say for this reason or the other. Incongruous action that it is, Hannibal feels distinctly like Will may be nodding at half past eight in the evening all the way from Wolf Trap, Virginia. Hannibal sighs in his bed in Oslo, Norway, and slowly lowers himself until he’s lying on his side. He worries for all of a few seconds before dismissing the fear and accepting the responsibility that comes with asking a potentially dangerous question.

“Will you tell me about Garrett Jacob Hobbs?”

With some trepidation but still keeping his tone light, Will asks, “Quid pro quo?”

“I tell you things,” Hannibal says, “you tell me things.”

“Quid pro quo,” Will confirms.

Hannibal gives him time to consider, turns onto his back and stares up at the ceiling. The blue and silver splashing the walls in his mind fade to dull gray and slate black, the colors of ash and scorched, felled trees. Somewhere amid that slowly building frenzy Will tells him yes.

“I’ll see you,” he murmurs, low and honest like a promise.

Some jubilant undercurrent in Hannibal’s subconscious sings. It bleeds into his voice when he answers, “Yes, you will.”

After Will hangs up, distinctly leaving Hannibal with the impression that he’s smiling, Hannibal continues to watch the peacefully blank ceiling. He lies there until Abel comes to retrieve him, dressed in casual, going-out attire, for dinner in the city. He ushers Hannibal back into his room, picks out a simple but tasteful outfit, and herds him into the bathroom to change.

He can’t wait to be back home again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sunday Kind of Love (Etta James) written by Barbara Belle, Anita Leonard, Stan Rhodes, and Louis Prima.
> 
> “Fool in the Rain” is by Led Zeppelin
> 
> “Careless Love” is a traditional song
> 
> From Jonathan Demme’s _Silence of the Lambs_ : “Quid pro quo. I tell you things, you tell me things.”


	17. Miss You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will waits his turn to welcome Hannibal home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _I’ve been holding out so long / I’ve been sleeping all alone / Lord, I miss you / I’ve been hanging on the phone / I’ve been sleeping all alone / I want to kiss you_

“I’d quite rather get him, if you don’t mind,” Mischa tells him over the sharp bark cutting through the silence on her end of the connection. She tuts Bixie’s name, voice farther from the phone. “He may need a ride _to_ the airport on Monday. I’m sure the band will like to shake hands and all that.”

Will hums, drawing little _X_ ’s in his mental planner. Hannibal’s coming home tonight, he’s got the funeral Saturday morning, and they’ll be off again on Monday, leaving him Sunday and not much else to himself. Mischa’s attending the funeral and planning to spend some of Sunday morning with Hannibal and the entirety of Nemean Lion. Will brought it up with Hannibal earlier that morning, asked if he might meet them, formally, while they were all in town for the service.

They’d been on the phone when Will asked, and Hannibal’s response had made him laugh, a belly laugh, loud and uncontrolled and ridiculous.

Hannibal said to him, _I won’t be responsible if I attempt to undress you in their presence. We’re entirely too comfortable with each other._ Will could hear his smile as he continued talking over Will’s uproar. _Two of them, at least, would probably help me with your pants, and that’s not to mention my sister._

Maybe detecting that she’s entered into his thoughts, she says, “You’re prepared for that, I hope.”

“Meeting the band?”

She rattles off a premeditated list: “Meeting the band, dining with the band, having certain members of the band apart from my brother sitting in your lap.”

Will sputters and has half a mind to deny it but knows how futile it would be.

He’s coming to the tail end of his lunch break, roaming the quad behind the Academy with a half-eaten sandwich in one hand and his phone in the other. He goes to take a bite, speaking before he does, “Well, now I’ll be disappointed if it doesn’t happen.”

She laughs at him, and he’s relieved. He worried she might bring up her uncle and how unprepared Will was when a guitar had come to be in his lap as if by magic. Maybe his relationship with Hannibal offsets everything else and makes the improbable things possible. He likes the idea of it and has the creeping suspicion that he has a similar effect in Hannibal’s life. He likes the idea of that reciprocity exceedingly.

“Wait,” he says, the word muffled by bread and pastrami. He makes a disgruntled noise and moves the phone away from his mouth to chew. Mischa’s chuckling at him. When he has a handle on himself, he asks, “Does that mean they habitually sit in Hannibal’s lap?”

“Oh, it’s usually Don.” Her tone is offhanded and warm. “He’ll sit in anyone’s lap. It’s why I worry about you.”

“Well, if Hannibal can handle a lapful of Donald Sutcliffe I think I can manage.”

“He actually really _prefers_ to be in Abel’s lap. I don’t know how that became the norm, but there it is.”

The noise he makes isn’t actually a laugh but some amazed, vaguely impressed sort of exclamation. “Abel _Gideon,_ the frowning pianist?”

Her laugh is like bells, bursting bouts of musical clarity and imprecision.

“Abel does smile sometimes, I swear he does.”

Will shakes his head, smile stretching into an open grin. He eats more of his sandwich and alerts to someone calling his name over his shoulder. It’s Jack, and Miriam Lass is at his side. They’re coming toward him.

“Well, I’ve got to get back. Call me when you have him home?”

“Yes, of course, Mr. Graham.” She’s smiling at him.

He sighs, ruffled, and says, “Thank you, Mischa.”

He tucks his phone into his pocket and quickly takes a huge bite of his sandwich as Jack draws nearer.

“Will,” he calls him again. “Are we interrupting?”

Will hums, jaw working. He shrugs and tells him, “I’ve got a minute.”

“Oh, I think you’re going to need that minute,” Miriam teases him. The small smile on her face makes it okay; admittedly, the fact of her friends being Will’s friends is what makes it kind of nice. She looks away from him at their mutual superior. “It doesn’t have to be now, Jack.”

“It’s good news,” he says deferentially. “You said you wanted to ask him in person and that you wanted to do it as soon as possible.”

Will continues to eat his sandwich. Miriam looks pressed for only a moment before turning to look at Will.

“How would you feel about conducting for the orchestra?”

Will chews dumbly and swallows.

“I think conducting is good.”

Jack chuckles, and it’s in moments like these that Will completely understands why Jack is in charge of the whole operation. He gives Miriam a steady glance, and when she does nothing to stop him, he brings his eyes to Will’s and clarifies, “Katz, Price, and Zeller put your name in for consideration, and Miriam wants you to take on the Virginia Symphony in January.”

He has articulate words prepared on the tip of his tongue, but instead of going with those, he blurts out, “Just like that?”

Miriam surprises him and reclaims the floor from Jack.

“Will, you play just about every instrument on hand, and the ones you don’t know you pick up in twenty minutes. I’ve seen you lecture, and I’ve seen you teach.” The expression on her face is soft and reigned in. “Whatever makes you think that you’re unqualified for the job, I could give you a dozen arguments against it.”

He only just refrains from babbling, “I’m inexperienced.”

“Everyone is in the beginning. The point is to learn.”

Jack nods. “If it’s too much to take on at once, we discussed the possibility of your being assistant conductor and viewing this as a trial run.”

Will appreciates the training wheels, but he also loathes that they’re training wheels. He considers it for a long while, glancing briefly at his watch for the time. He’s got about five minutes left of his lunch, and he hasn’t finished his sandwich.

“Think about it, Will,” Miriam beseeches him. “Everyone’s really excited for what this could do for you.”

By everyone he knows she means Beverly, Jimmy, and Brian. He’s starting to really question how her recommendation came to pass, but he’ll save it for any combination of their three mutual friends. 

“I like teaching,” he protests, though it’s not an argument, really.

What Miriam’s offering him is incredible, though it’s never occurred to him as a viable shift in his career. He’d always taught private lessons. Only occasionally did he do larger groups, and he can tell just by imagining a larger orchestra how very different and new the experience would be.

Jack repeats Miriam’s words: “Think about it, Will. At least think about it.”

“Yeah,” he replies, nodding foggily. Reality catches up to him and he jerks out of stillness to reach out for Miriam’s hand. “Thank you, Miriam.”

She smiles and shakes his hand. Though her grip is slightly weak it doesn’t show on her face or in her voice. “Sure, Will.”

The weakness in her hand is a big part of why she leads the orchestra now rather than playing first chair at every concert. He smiles then because he understands. He gets why she was subtle but companionable with him at dinner and why her kindness to him now bleeds and breathes genuine. They were both wounded and taken, however briefly or permanently, away from music.

She looks at him, and a small smile breaks out across her face at the realization she senses in him; he knew her angle, and she knew he knew it. Jack touches her arm and she lets go of Will’s hand. The gleam in her eyes changes the whole look of her face, makes her look much happier and younger, almost girlish. She could be Abigail’s sister.

He waits a while where they leave him and polishes off his sandwich before heading back to the building. Beverly texts him as he’s getting back to his room.

_**Miriam talk to you yet?** _

He smirks in spite of himself.

**And Jack too. How much did you know about it?**

Beverly doesn’t text him back in time for him to check before his next student comes in, so he has to soldier through it—an oboe lesson, so not bad, all things considered—before he can get back to her. Even then he’s pressed for time, and she picks up on it.

_**Stop being noble and take the job Will. You’d be fantastic at it.** _

He leaves that where it is and focuses on work, though that goal is complicated when Jimmy and Brian both get in on the action and start texting him.

Brian writes him, _**I’m betting you float a foot off the ground when you get in front of a group that big.**_

Not to be outdone, Jimmy’s text reads, _**You’ll give Karajan a run for his money.**_

Because he doesn’t doubt they’re having some kind of competition over who can give the better pep talk, Will informs the two of them that Jimmy wins with his Karajan comment.

**_Damn._ **

**_:)_ **

After work he calls Abigail. While the phone rings he collects his things and heads out the door into the hallway with his bag weighing down his shoulder and the phone pressed against his ear. Most everyone else has left by this point, and Mischa still hasn’t called him. He did ask her to let him know when she got him _home_ , so he reasons that they could be out doing any number of things: spending time with the Du Maurier family, going out to dinner, sitting in a bar catching up.

“Hello,” Abigail halfway sings.

“Hi. You home?”

“Yes, I am. Are you on your way?”

“Yeah, should I pick up something?”

“I was going to order a pizza.”

He hums, deciding immediately that pizza sounds delicious.

“I could go for pizza.”

“Pepperoni okay?”

“That’s fine, and whatever else you like.” He fishes around in his jacket for his car keys, unlocks his car, and throws his bag into the backseat. “Get breadsticks.”

“The cheesy kind or the regular kind?”

He thinks about it long and hard as he’s sliding into the driver’s seat and pulling the door shut behind him. He says, “Cheesy.”

“I agree.”

“All right, I’ll be home in a bit.”

“All right, pops.”

His first instinct is to freeze up and panic, but because they’re on the phone and they’re hanging up he isn’t obligated to say anything back. She ends the call before he can linger on it too long, but it stays with him, leaves him sitting in strange, confused silence for a few minutes after the fact. It’s not the first time she’s called him something like it, but he isn’t used to it. He’s not sure he ever will be.

Stravinsky’s Petrushka drifts into life on the radio when he starts the car. The song is more than halfway through and all flurried notes and dissonant chords. It lightens into lilting, sonorous melodies like rain misting through clouds.

It’s hard not to imagine himself conducting a piece like this once. He could do it, stand at the median point between two massive walls of congregating people, darkness and silence on one side and light and music on the other. Often enough he actualizes music through those means anyway—parses out the only logic he can from the clutter and ambience. His logic typically rests within cadences, the ephemeral pauses in between movements, the shifts up and down the neck of an instrument.

Sometimes he finds cadence in laughter; sometimes the movements are bouts of laughter or bad jokes; sometimes the instrument is a root beer float or a Great Dane named Bixie.

Sometimes Abigail is those things to him, and sometimes it’s Beverly or Brian and Jimmy bantering.

Sometimes it’s Hannibal.

He’s ten minutes out from the house when his phone rings. He swears and takes an exit off the freeway, continuing to swear under his breath until he can manage to get the car parked in a random residential area. He fiddles the buzzing thing out of his pocket and answers it blindly.

“Hello?”

“Will,” Hannibal answers pleasantly, sounding just touched with alcohol. “I’m home.”

“Oh,” he laughs, and he can hear Mischa laughing somewhere near him. “Good.”

“Are you free Saturday night?”

He would move the earth to make himself free if he weren’t. “Yes.”

“To yours or to mine then?”

Oh, the unfairness of it.

“I’m on my way home now. Let me see if Abigail wants to do something for dinner, and I’ll get back to you.”

“Of course.”

An idea starts to brew in Will’s mind that’s counter to Hannibal’s suggestions, but he keeps it to himself for further independent planning. He thinks to tell Hannibal about Miriam’s offer but decides to keep that to himself, too, for right now. There are a number of conversations they’ve yet to have in person that need to be had in person; this can be another.

Not thinking, Will says, “I’ll call you then, babe,” and then grins and leans on his steering wheel, blushing and covering his face with his hand.

Hannibal chuckles, and he sounds calm and happy.

“Until then, Will.”

He gets back on the freeway and shakes his head while Bocelli serenades him. It’s when he’s pulling into the driveway and his chest still tickles with a funny, warm pull that a rebellious thought hits him.

Abigail’s heart might swell and brim over when she slips and calls him pops.

It’s a daring thought to have. He holds it close to his chest and takes his bag from the backseat of the Crown Victoria before making for the house. He’s not two steps up the drive when Abigail opens the door and the dogs come rushing out to greet him. He experiences a very real rush of gratitude for Bixie and Tianlu in that moment. At least Hannibal’s been exposed to dogs and it won’t be a total shock when he gets an eyeful of Will’s pack of seven.

“Pizza’s here,” she calls out, holding the door open for him.

“I hope you started without me.”

“I’m on my second slice,” she informs him with a happy smile.

He follows her into the kitchen, drops his bag off on the couch, and notes the music playing very softly in the background of shuffling dogs and scraping chairs. It’s low like mood lighting and vaguely sad. He makes himself a plate and sits down at the table.

“What is that?”

“Hmm?” She sits across from him and takes a huge bite of a cheesy breadstick. 

“The music, what…”

He listens, trying to place the artist. It’s a blend between contemporary blues and something that he can only liken to the painful fervor and vitality of duende. 

“I was browsing at the store today,” she hedges, dipping into the marinara sauce.

“And you brought back—”

“ _We kept the waves and winds that spring…_ ”

Will stops and whips around to look at the stereo, confused at the familiar croon. 

“ _Latched them to our hearts like rucksacks ‘cross our backs in spacious canyons, kept seagulls’ songs and funnel cake fumes…_ ”

He blinks and turns back to face her. The look on her face is thoroughly satisfied.

“Nemean Lion.”

She grins, a laugh on her lips. “I wondered how long it’d take you to catch on.”

“ _Subtle powdered sugar, sea salt, loam…_ ”

“Oh, my God,” he mutters in the next instant, mortified. “I haven’t listened to _any_ of their music. I’m the worst boyfriend, Abigail.”

“Well, you’re listening now, so get used to it.” She gives him an entertained glance and a shrug of her shoulders before trading her cheesy breadstick off her slice of pepperoni. “Eat your pizza. This is my favorite song.”

He does eat and gratefully accepts the soda she pours for him. Briefly he imagines Hannibal sitting beside him doing something domestic and indulgent like stealing the pepperoni off Will’s pizza and stacking the pilfered pieces high on his own plate like coins for later. Hannibal probably plays footsies.

“ _We told the sun, the moon, be easy…_ ”

He smiles. Hannibal definitely plays footsies.

“ _We cast distraction to the tide—that ocean deep sank black against the daylight like a Caravaggio. We watched the day collapse unto the beach, and sand clung to our toes, too distraught to let us go. A red sun sleeps and flings the moon from shadow._ ”

“I hadn’t noticed before,” Will murmurs at a break in the lyrics, listening for Hannibal in the subdued saxophone part. “Don can sing.”

Abigail chokes on her pizza.

“Front men usually can,” she says as she’s recovering. “But I guess I wouldn’t have noticed either if I’d fallen madly in love with the band’s saxophonist on sight.”

His reply to that is to offer up a weak, totally harmless glare. She just smiles triumphantly.

“Abel Gideon wrote this song. It’s off their newest CD.”

“Oh?”

Will tunes back into the lyrics, wondering about the frowning pianist who does smile sometimes, Mischa swears.

“ _The palpitations of our dreams remained unchanging, although the tide and shoreline waned. Horizons couched us comfortably. You were a demigoddess, and a mad scientist was I. You were divine; I, but flesh. Down, the sun; down, the moon._ ”

Creeping out of the lull of the Aeolian mode is Hannibal, insinuating a melody over the meshing harmonies fluctuating all up and down the E minor pentatonic. Will relaxes, a smile comfortably claiming his lips. Hannibal’s music is dusky like a sunset and piercing like a letter that comes too late.

Don bays—and Will means the classification as a compliment—at the tail end of his solo, “ _My memory washes clean of you, and what we meant becomes unknown to me._ ”

They eat in silence and listen.

“ _We lived whispers, carnal sin, and then you went away, honey. You took with you the sun and moon. You were the sun, the moon._ ”

After the words there’s music, pleading and mournful but proud and contained. It surges without crushing itself, embodies passion without giving too much. When the end comes it’s just Bedelia and Abel playing, everyone else having tapered off to leave them with the last fragment of music. Bedelia is peripheral but integral to Abel’s outro; the balance between rhythm and lead is perfectly maintained between them. Any two members of Nemean Lion, Will is sure, could make up a band of their own and retain a splendid sound.

Any one player is instrumental to two others, making the deviation of a solo or a duet in a piece that much more poignant and glittering. When the song ends on a sorrowful downbeat, Will sighs.

Abigail muses, “Good, aren’t they?”

“Yes,” he agrees, snatching a cheesy breadstick out of the brown paper bag they came in. “Does Abel write all of their songs?”

“He wrote one other song. Fuller writes a lot of them; Sutcliffe, too.” She pauses to sip her soda. “Hannibal wrote the second to last one on the record.”

Will nods and asks the track name.

“I think it’s called ‘Five Rivers Wide.’”

He wonders at the title. “Have you listened to it?”

“Yeah, it’s…really depressing, actually.”

“Oh, in what way?”

She withdraws into herself, slightly, and draws lines with one finger through the perspiration accrued on her glass. He doesn’t push her to speak the words already brewing behind the aloof mask of her face.

“It’s traumatized,” she finally gets out. “The lyrics are…if my dad hadn’t done,” she falters, “If he hadn’t _been_ who he was and did what he did, then maybe I would have missed it.”

There’s silence between them for a while. The music continues to play over that silence.

“How do you mean?”

“I guess on the surface it looks really deep and philosophical, and it _is,_ just like the rest of them are, but there was something beneath it that clawed at me and…made me remember.”

If there’s a right way to reply, he can’t access it. All he knows to say is, “Knowing him it was probably intentional.”

“If it was, he’s a genius.”

He smiles. “And if it wasn’t?”

She studies him for a few long, slow seconds. “Then he’s more like you than you thought.”

There’s no real way to respond to that either, at least not that he can locate and put to words. He just drops his eyes and goes back to his food, managing to segue some minutes later into an inquiry of how her day went over.

“Slow day at the store. Mostly these college students came in and didn’t buy anything. Marissa had a ball.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Did you?”

“What, me?” She doesn’t color at his question. Its effect on her is closer to amusement than embarrassment. “No, they were pretty boring.”

“So there’s no long-haired football player for me to contend with?”

She grins. “One love story at a time is enough for me, thank you.”

He rolls his eyes, and she asks him how work was.

“Well, I might be working with the Virginia Symphony in January.”

“Really?” Her eyes light up at this information. “Why ‘might’? Who do we have to whack?”

“Wha—I…Nobody’s getting…” He frowns. “We are not whacking anyone.”

“Well, what then?” Her expression is playful, excited, and curious.

“One of my colleagues has it all lined up for me to do it. All I have to do is accept it.”

“Oh, my God!” She slaps her hands on the table. “So accept it! Why wouldn’t you want to do it?”

He looks away, embarrassed.

“It just feels like a big step.”

“Mr. Graham,” she sighs. “Your life is _made up_ of big steps.”

“That doesn’t detract from how big they are.”

“No, you’re right,” she agrees, tipping her chin. “You’re forced to be stronger for it.”

He starts to protest, but it’s not an argument that will win out. It can’t win out because Abigail is a part of the counterpoint. Hannibal is a part of the counterpoint. His job and the dogs and his music are parts of the counterpoint. The risk of loss and the promise of pain do make him stronger; they _have_ made him stronger.

“I say you take it, but only if you really want to,” she says, a final voice on the matter.

“Well, I’m going to think about it,” he promises.

It’s the least he can do since he did tell both Jack and Miriam that he would. The conclusion of this conversation brings him to his second topic of discussion, pretty seamlessly, he thinks, since they’re talking about him taking things he wants.

“Hannibal’s free tomorrow night, so we were going to do dinner. Do you think you’d like to have him over then?”

“I don’t want to get in the way of your first night _alone_ while he’s back.” She winks, and his neck goes warm. Hesitating just a smidgeon she says, “We could go hunting after he gets back.”

Will smiles, twisting a napkin around his fingers.

“I’ll be honest. I don’t know the first thing about it.”

“Well, I’ll teach you.” She shrugs like it’s the easiest thing in the world. “You teach me to fish; I teach you to hunt.”

“I am an advocate for equality in this household.”

“Reciprocity,” she says, “Give and take.”

Smirking now, he adds, “Quid pro quo.”

“Yes, exactly.” She nods, missing the joke he has with himself and with Hannibal. “So remind me why you’re waiting ‘till tomorrow to go see him?”

“He’s got his sister and the band, not to mention the funeral in the morning.” He stands to trash his paper plate. “I don’t want to complicate things. They’re only here for a few days.”

“I thought that would be a reason to _definitely_ complicate things.”

“I mean,” Will talks as he’s washing his hands, “I like that we’ve had some time to be away from each other. Now that he’s back for a little while I don’t want to dive right back in where we left off.” He considers his words as he’s drying his hands on a towel and handing it off to Abigail after she’s washed her hands, too. “Okay, I really do want to dive back in, but he’s not _home_ yet. It wouldn’t be smart.”

“Makes sense.” She hops up to sit on the counter beside him, folding the dish towel in her lap as her legs kick out one after the other. “What does Hannibal think?”

“Oh, he’s…” Will sighs wistfully and remembers to listen for the music still going in the other room. “He’s ready to get settled again.”

Softly she says, “Yeah?”

He chuckles, hearing what he sounds like.

“It’ll be nice, when we can…just _be_ for a while, without all these deadlines dictating when we can see each other.”

“That will be nice.”

“Did you paint anything today?”

“I started on a new canvas, but it’s blank right now. Still looking for the subject, you know?”

“Yeah. What were you thinking about doing?”

“First I was thinking something abstract, but the more I tossed around the idea, the more…the more I could see I was just dancing around painting my mom.”

Will’s quiet next to her. The music’s going through their rest.

“ _…Boughs of sunburnt ivory, like the charred remains of some elephant’s tusks, were the dogwood blossoms…_ ”

Strictly moderating his tone, he offers, “Maybe it would help to paint her.”

With an even voice she asks, “The way she was or the way I remember her now?”

“How do you remember her?”

Abigail doesn’t look at him. She keeps her eyes on the far wall, and her voice doesn’t tremble once.

“With her throat slashed open.”

Will swallows and looks straight ahead with her. 

“ _I went up to rescue your little red balloon. Wouldn’t you know? The damned thing slipped right through my fingers._ ”

“Could you paint her that way?”

“Bloody,” Abigail asks tonelessly. “Dying?”

He sets his hands behind him on the counter, clutching with his fingers and steeling himself.

“If she is that way regardless,” he murmurs, careful of where he steps and heedful of making any outward show of how hard his heart is pounding in his chest, “If you can’t remember her any other way, maybe you can use it.”

She sighs, “So it stops using me.”

“I love your landscapes,” he professes shamelessly. “I love your seascapes; I love when you paint the dogs or Hannibal’s backyard.”

She kicks her feet out, slowly.

“What if I painted us?”

He tries to smile, but it’s hollow. That part of him still clangs hollowly at the mention of what happened to them. He says, “Bloody and dying?”

“Bloody and surviving,” she corrects, looking upon him at last. “We survived.”

Solemnly, he tells her, “Yes, we did.”

“And that’s…” She loses her breath and drops her eyes. “That should be the thing I carry out of it.”

“For both of us.”

She brings her eyes back to his and searches a while before asking, “Would you be okay with that? If I painted it?”

“I don’t want this to hurt us anymore, Abigail.” She had told him before that her way of coping had been to leave it behind. Hearing now that she couldn’t manage quite so easily as she let on makes him feel better about the trouble he’s had, though it does nothing for her, he knows. “If doing this makes it worse, I need you to tell me that it does, and we’ll figure out together how to make it better.”

She laughs, low and quiet. Her hand finds his shoulder and stays there, holding on. She says, “Okay.”

They linger a while longer in the kitchen, her poised on the counter and him leaning within arms’ reach. Some time has elapsed when she rouses beside him at the changed song playing in the next room.

“Hannibal’s song comes after this one.”

Though neither of them says anything on the topic of cleaning the kitchen they both get to work putting away the dirtied glasses and the leftover pizza. He follows her into the den and sits on one end of the couch after moving his bag from the cushion to the coffee table. Abigail settles in on the end opposite him and stretches her legs out.

“I looked it up because it reads like a poem on paper, and apparently it was written in the style of tanka poetry, which is a Japanese form.”

The current song skips into dead air and then picks up, and before the words come Will knows it’s Hannibal’s song. More prominent than the other parts that constitute the opening is the saxophone, understated but rising above the rest of it still. The song carries on that way through the first minute and then into the second. Just as it starts to lull him, Don croons, “ _Dark, frozen peril…_ ”

He perks up, waiting for more words that don’t come. Abigail’s watching him, maybe to see if his reaction will echo her own.

“ _Its wilderness…_ ”

They’re decidedly gloomy, these lyrics, but the surrounding music supports it, supports the melancholy and the pacing. It encourages a kind of dreadful anticipation.

“ _Devoured me._ ”

Will tries to relax around it and to feel Hannibal in it the way he could at La Fin Absolue du Monde. He can’t relax, but the latter half of his efforts, they don’t go unrewarded.

“ _Smothered…_ ”

Abigail had likened it to trauma. Without knowing that it had been Hannibal’s experience she had placed it, and as he places himself inside of it and lets the swell overtake him, he can trace the pattern of thought that led her to the correct conclusion.

“ _My heart’s pyre._ ”

Where Hannibal’s playing had been the rush of a warm wind before it was now the bottled bluster of late spring, early summer. It was wholesomeness a hairsbreadth from fragmentation and continuity just shy of disorder. Don played translator and ambassador perfectly; there was nothing of him to be heard in the words but the rawness of his voice being torn out of him to share Hannibal’s words, Hannibal’s pain.

Building nearly to a scream, he groans, “ _Sanguine wrong I delivered._ ”

The music crests and then hovers, suspended, and Will can hear Don catching his breath on the recording. He doesn’t know if it’s intentional. Either way it’s fantastic. There is something inherently musical about it, though much of it isn’t technically first-rate. He respects it more for the intensity, unbarred by formal rigidity. And Hannibal’s playing, God; if Don’s voice is being ripped straight from his diaphragm, the sounds Hannibal produces are being wrenched directly out of his soul.

After a tussle high up in the Dorian mode between Abel’s piano and Hannibal’s saxophone, the music eases, just like Petrushka does at the very end. 

Calmly, as if something at first unfathomable has been resolved, Don finishes, “ _Penance forged in fire erased._ ”

Don holds the sustained note, voice trembling beautifully as in the style of a subtle, fragile vibrato, and when his voice fades, so does the music. Will shivers, cold and hot and restless before he can eloquently catalogue why.

“What’d you think?”

Will opens his eyes, startled. For a moment he thought he might be asleep. His voice is rough when he says, “Traumatized was the right word.”

She nods and reorients herself on the couch, leaning one arm into the back of the couch and resting her head.

The final song starts playing, and Will forgets to listen, though he feels guilty for not even putting in the effort. He asks her if she has plans for tomorrow night, and she tells him she’s probably going to stay in and work on that painting they discussed. She asks him when he’s going to see Hannibal and he has no idea, so she smirks at him and tells him he better get on it then.

“I’m going to bed. You can borrow the CD if you want. I put it on the laptop already.”

“Thank you.”

She stands and regards him for a moment with her head tilted slightly to one side.

“He’s lucky to have you, too, you know.”

Will looks back at her, unembarrassed this time and possessing not a single doubt as to whether she’s telling him the truth. He says, “Yeah, he is.”

A wide smile spreads slowly across her face, and she turns on her heel to leave for her room. She calls goodnight over her shoulder, and he returns the sentiment. The music keeps playing in her absence, and he’s still not checked in properly, so he can’t attend to it the way he’d like to, but it’s wonderful all the same. It’s coaxing and patient and deliberate; it reminds him of Hannibal.

He takes out his phone and dials 8. Hannibal sounds recovered from his probable libations earlier.

“Dinner at yours okay?”

“That will be splendid.”

Will sighs and moves his shoulders against the couch. Winston comes to sniff at his knee and Will scratches his ears.

“Abigail decided to take me hunting for your welcome back dinner.”

Hannibal hums, a soft, unassuming laugh punctuating the sound. “Do you hunt, Will?”

“I do not.”

He gets another laugh, low and confidential. “I am already highly impressed with your efforts.”

“We’re just getting started,” Will tells him in a small but excited voice.

He’s happy, damn it. He’s a happy, crazy son of a bitch, and Hannibal is right there with him. They’re insane and what they have is insane, and they’re both refusing, insanely, to let it go.

Hannibal muses, “We’ve come a long way to find the beginning.”

“I needed a winding path. Even the first time we met, there was something missing.”

He needed subversion from himself, from his bias, from his rules. It took a stranger daring to call him mad for his walls to shudder, and it took a bullet in his chest and a nearly fatally wounded girl to open his mind to the possibility of lowering those walls for just one night, for just such a stranger. Fate being what it is, of course he didn’t get a stranger; of course he couldn’t have taken one night only.

He’d wanted to give more had been the problem. Yes, taking was good and fine, but Hannibal made him want to give back that which he took.

Hannibal made him want to stick around in an empty parking lot; Hannibal drew him out into the back alley of The Absolute End of the World; Hannibal drove them to his home and they slept together and they ate breakfast together and they kissed like teenagers in Hannibal’s room while his uncle waited downstairs.

Hannibal introduced Will and Abigail to Mischa. 

“No,” Will revises. “All of it was there from the start.”

In a small voice Hannibal asks him, “Do you think so?”

“Yeah, I do.”

“Then in that case you got what you wanted after all,” Hannibal states, obviously smiling. 

“What does that mean?”

“We had the ideal meet-cute, just like you wished we did.”

Will blinks, confused for only a second before it comes flooding back to him in a sharp, resurgent memory: _Would have been the ideal meet-cute._

And Hannibal had said, _I quite like the way we met._

“I can’t believe you remember that,” he mumbles, pleased.

“It was an important night, for both of us.”

 _I love you,_ Will almost says, just because it’s there tickling at the roof of his mouth and begging to be said.

Just like pops or babe. Just natural, fluid, and effortless.

_I love you._

“Hannibal,” he says instead because the name grounds him to an almost frightening degree.

He hums once in question, and God, _Christ,_ Will loves him. Hannibal had said it to him before, hadn’t he; he’d slipped it out there and left it hanging in the open and Will hadn’t acted and he should have, and he couldn’t make the same mistake again. Life had brought them here, or maybe fate had, and anything could tear them apart. It was just the state of things.

It’s not enough of a reason to say something like, _I love you._

But feeling it is the only reason he needs.

“I love you.”

There’s a moment of stunned silence, but Will isn’t afraid in its hectic, upside down vortex. He’s ecstatic. Hannibal breathes a noisy gust of a sigh.

“Thank God.”

Will hunches his shoulder forward to laugh. Hannibal doesn’t laugh, but something similar is happening on his end. It’s tangible, and it crackles like static, only the connection is crystalline.

“You can be very stubborn, Will Graham.”

“I wish I could tell you that it fades the closer I am to a person, but it really doesn’t.”

“Neither do my faults, habits, and eccentricities.”

Will grins. “We’ve got time to negotiate.”

“Not tomorrow, I hope.”

His grin dwindles, but the warmth coiling in his stomach blooms.

“Tomorrow we’ll do whatever you want.”

“A lot of it I think you’ll want as well,” Hannibal says, more than a little suggestively.

Will smirks. “Only a lot of it?”

“Other things, perhaps, will require persuasion on my part.”

He recalls the rope and shivers. Breathless, he confides, “Well, I’d be open to that.”

“Good,” Hannibal murmurs.

Will aimlessly checks his watch, agitated now for the drive to Hannibal’s house.

“I should let you get to bed. You’ve got an early morning tomorrow.”

“Yes,” Hannibal sighs, his tone changing entirely. “I will call you when it is all finished.”

“Goodnight, Hannibal.”

“Goodnight, my love.”

Will feels his face go warm as he stands to switch off the stereo. He makes his way to his room and grins the whole way, muttering, “Crazy sons of bitches.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From Thomas Harris’ _Red Dragon,_ : “When I looked at him again, maybe my face changed, I don’t know. I knew it and he knew I knew it.”
> 
> Wonky poem/song things were written by me.


	18. If You Need Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everybody needs somebody.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Always thinking of you / I still love, love, love / Always thinking of you / Don’t wait too long / When things go wrong / I’ll be there, right there / Where I belong_

Will stops at two places before he decides he’s probably overthinking it. The first time he buys condoms and lube, in anticipation and consideration of Hannibal’s maybe coming to stay the night at his place when he comes back after the Lyon show. The second time he cracks and buys flowers. Maybe his priorities are skewed. He’s helpless to do anything about it.

Abigail laughs at him when she sees him bring the bouquet, roses, of all things, into the house. She asks him, already speckled across her wrist and knuckles with red paint the same shade of the flowers tucked in against his arm, “No chocolates?”

“I’m nervous,” he admits, moving the ostentatious bouquet from one hand to the other. He practices holding it out casually, but every time he does it the action is awkward, stilted. “Should probably put them in water, right?”

“Yeah, here,” she says, coming up and taking them off his hands before breezing into the kitchen.

He follows after, stepping out of his shoes and lingering near the door while she flits around looking for a vase he isn’t sure he has.

“I don’t think you should be nervous. Hannibal probably feels exactly the way you do right now.”

“Well, that makes me feel a different kind of nervous.”

She gives him a look over her shoulder and roots around once more in the cabinets. Will almost doesn’t recognize the simple glass vase she pulls out. He’s pretty sure he took it from home before he came from Louisiana to live in Virginia. As a kid he always brought wildflowers into the house, and his father’s solution had been to bring home the vase now in Abigail’s hands. It hadn’t come to be with him today because he wanted it but because his father didn’t. It’s a sweeter memory than it maybe has any right to be.

_It’ll only remind me you’re not around anymore to steal flowers from the Leeds’ yard._

_I never stole flowers from the Leedses,_ Will had told him. _The Jacobis had the same kind of flowers, and they didn’t ever mind._

“How does that look?”

He blinks.

“It’s real nice, Abigail, thanks.”

Will frowns and approaches the flowers in the vase like they’re not to be trusted. He touches a smooth red petal, considering his next move.

“Maybe I should just take one.”

“But you bought a whole bouquet,” she protests. “They’re pretty.”

“Well, I don’t know. Do you think…I mean, do I give him flowers? Would that be weird?”

“It’ll be sweet,” she counters, picking one rose out of the bunch by the stem and examining it. Will chose a bouquet with the thorns left intact, and while he’d told himself it was a whimsical thing, he’s starting to reevaluate his decision. Abigail notes the thorns, too; she pokes the sharp point of one with her finger and gives him an appraising look. “You need to give him all of these roses.”

Weakly, he asks, “All of them?” 

“Well, not this one.” She waves it at him like it’s a wand. “I want this one.”

He tucks the vase of flowers into the bottom shelf of the refrigerator and follows her when she walks toward the den, pocketing his hands. Waiting for a few beats but not with an air of hesitation or reluctance, she asks, “Do you want to see what I have so far?”

“You’ve made some progress?”

“It’s mostly just red,” she confesses, a light shade of the color tinting her cheeks. “A bunch of different tones of red.”

“I’d like to see it,” he says with a nod.

She leads him down the hall, stepping her sandaled feet around the splattered drops of paint. They don’t mention it since it’s happened before. He knows she’ll clean up once she’s done. Precedence suggests she won’t do anything irreparably damaging to his house, so he doesn’t worry about the paint drying on the floorboards.

“Well,” she tells him in a small, self-conscious voice. “Here it is.”

There it is. She wasn’t lying about all the red, but there are other colors, too, and the white areas in the canvas haven’t all been painted over yet. He recognizes his blue shirt in the midst of the swirling, amorphous mist occluding much of the painting-in-progress. Emerging from the bottom of the canvas is the red-spotted suggestion of a pale arm reaching for him as the figure representing him bleeds. It’s been painted in Abigail’s perspective. This is the part where he called an ambulance just after shooting her father seven times. 

He always thought maybe hatred is the thing that kept her alive that day—hatred for him or for Garrett Jacob Hobbs, he’s never been able to tell. She definitely hated Will in the beginning, when they’d both been victimized.

She says his name, and he sucks a ragged breath into his lungs. There are tears in his eyes when he blinks them open. His fingers have found the roughened platform of one side of the canvas where some tacky paint smudges his skin. He takes his hand away, and an accusing streak of red ensnares and immobilizes him.

More noticeably worried, she tries again. “Will.”

He stammers out, “Yeah, yes?”

“Is it going to be too much? You don’t have to look at it when it’s finished if you don’t want to.”

He takes a careful step away from the canvas, rubbing his thumb against the paint sticking to his skin. Harris had taught him a bit more about what to do in situations like this, when he felt overwhelmed by what had happened and at the strength and potency it still carried in his life. Granted, he’d avoided discussing the issue for weeks before bringing it up in therapy one day. She’d told him to breathe deeply and to concentrate on reality and the here-and-now.

 _You’re alive and your arm works. You saved that girl’s life. Now **lift**_ the weight, Will Graham. 

_I’m alive and my arm works,_ he tells himself. _I saved Abigail’s life._

_Now **lift** the weight, Graham. _

“It was my idea,” he says, shaking his head once something close enough to calm reaches him at last. He catches his breath again before turning to look at her. There’s a strange expression on her face but no words to help him clarify what it is she’s showing him. “If you’re in, I’m in, too.”

But Abigail, she sees just as much as Will does if not much more sometimes. She’s smart. She sees through to the real problem at hand that Will doesn’t vocalize. She asks, “Why this scene?”

The soft reverence in her voice reminds him of the few times he heard her mother speak. It sends a chill through him, uncanny event that it is. It’s like the visitation of her dead father in his sleep, the long wait before he can convince himself the scenes are only nightmares. There are dozens of things that rush to the surface, dozens of replies that are all true and would answer her question comprehensively enough for her to never have to ask again why this scene torments him the way it does. There are a hundred ways to answer, a _hundred._

She isn’t asking for any of them, and they both know it. Abigail is asking for the Golden Ticket, the thing he holds to his chest that maybe she’s suspected for a while now.

“This is when…” The breath rushes right out of his lungs. He tries again, and she waits, patiently watching him as he struggles for the voice to actualize this most private thought that he has kept stowed away since the moment it first entered into his thoughts. He swallows and goes on, haltingly, “It’s the thing that brought me you.”

And there it is on her face, just what he thought he’d see if she ever came to know his mind: a shadow of revulsion, a flicker of disbelief, tears…

Her voice breaks on the question, “You’re glad it happened?”

“ _No_ , Abigail.” And he means it. He would swear on everything that he means it even though the sound that bursts out of her breaks his heart. “But it—” He loses his breath again, heart hammering in his chest. “It happened, and I can never change that it did.” The urge to step closer is firmly denied. The urge to flee the room is ignored. The urge to take a step back is considered and then rejected. “We’re here, together, _alive_. We…we survived.” 

They stand and watch each other, unseeing, eyes blurred as they are with tears. The last thing he saw before his own glossed over was a steady stream of tears escaping one wide, frantic eye and jumping down to Abigail’s chin. He hears the rose when it impacts the floor with a soft but sharp slap. His hands go to his eyes to rub the tears away, and there are arms closing around his midsection and a wet face buried in his chest, right about where Garrett Jacob Hobbs shot him.

“I thought you…” Her voice is both strangled and muffled by his shirt. He misses some of what she says. “…because you felt guilty.”

His arms wrap around her back instinctively, wanting to give comfort where comfort is being sought.

“What?”

She shakes her head, and her arms are trembling around him.

“I thought you didn’t want me here. I thought I reminded you of what happened, thought you’d get better faster if I wasn’t around…”

There’s a long list of I thought I…I thought you…I thought we… that follows after, and he listens, stunned and speechless. It goes on, and it jolts in his heart how selfish he’s been not to think even once that Abigail might have been just as desperate to seek shelter with him as he was to seek it with her. He’d been caught up in the tar trap of _his_ worries and doubts and fears of failure and loneliness. All along he thought he’d done his part to make her feel welcome, but that had never been the problem. Welcome guest or not, she had felt _unwanted_. She had felt like an intruder or a charity case and not like a part of his mélange family of dogs, coworkers, and friends.

It’s clear now, the way a gunshot catapults a screaming room into temporary silence. She’d been hostile at first because she expected him to be. She’d hesitated to let him in because she thought he’d send her away once the mourning period was up. Maybe over time her opinion of him had changed, as he believes it has, but the fear would have persisted in the beginning. It would have been every bit as real as his fear, so unbelievably similar to her own. They feared and dreaded the same thing, and they had never spoken it aloud.

“No, Abigail,” he whispers, _meaning_ it. “No, no, no, hey.”

She rocks with him when he starts to twist one way and then the other. It’s not a solution to the hurt or an excuse for his idiocy, but he tells her all the same, “I didn’t know, I didn’t know. I’m so sorry.”

He thought he’d become a father figure, but maybe they’d just been playing house, until now.

The revelation even explains why she’d been so horrified the first few times she called him dad by accident, before she knew he wouldn’t object to it as long as it was okay with her. He hadn’t set a very good example for that either, all those times he balked and reacted unfavorably.

_Oh, what an asshat._

“I’ve always been so grateful to have you here,” he says into her hair, still rocking gently and rubbing in the general vicinity of her shoulders with one hand. “From Day One, I’ve been grateful.”

They’re quiet for a long time. Eventually Abigail takes one arm from around his back to swipe at her face the back and heel of her hand.

She laughs shakily. “Even when I sabotaged your coffee supply?”

He frowns, sets his hands on her shoulders, and leans back enough to look at her, though she doesn’t look at him right away.

“You did that on purpose?”

Hesitating, “I thought you knew I did.”

“Well, I _guessed_ maybe the first day you made a _mistake._ ”

Abigail laughs, some hopeful hybrid of anxiety and amusement. “You said Day One. No take-backs.”

Her cheeks are red where her fingers rubbed at her tears. A few specks cling to her eyelashes like dew to grass. He rubs at her back again and waits for her eyes to climb back up to his. In a gentle voice he says, “No, none of those.”

She clenches her jaw and hugs him again, arms firm now and not trembling. When they part he crouches down to retrieve the fallen rose and holds it out to her, a natural, familiar arc taking over at his elbow and following through to his wrist. Her eyes are down and her smile small when she takes it from him.

“You didn’t say if you liked it,” she says, starting to turn again to the canvas.

Now that all his cards are on the table, it doesn’t frighten him nearly as much as it did. It had been something like the portrait of Dorian Gray for him, like experiencing the ugliest reality of himself that would eat him alive and stop his heart if he let it. Maybe he would have if it hadn’t been Abigail’s fear, too. It had been, though, and here they are, again, standing side-by-side and looking at it—so much evidence making both their hands red as if with murder.

His verdict is, “Am I that wide through the shoulders?”

She laughs, and he decides it was the right thing to say.

“Take a break,” he suggests. “Come sit with me at the piano.”

She smiles. “Okay.”

He plays around a bit, easing off the few times she goes to try a melody out for herself. When it feels okay, he stretches his right arm around her shoulders and relaxes when she leans into his side. Sometime in the middle of his left-handed rendition of one of Rachmaninoff’s piano sonatas his phone starts ringing in the next room. Will doesn’t hear it, but Abigail does. She taps on the wrist laid up against her arm and angles her head to the kitchen.

Once he’s in the room he can hear that it is, in fact, buzzing on the table. He takes it up and answers just as Abigail starts fiddling around a familiar fugue on the piano.

“Hello?”

Mischa’s chipper voice greets him, “Will!”

He checks the caller ID. Mischa called from a number Will’s phone doesn’t recognize.

“Hi, Mischa, what’s going on?”

“My darling idiot brother is going on, all about you, beautiful moron that he is.”

He sputters a laugh and rubs at the back of his neck.

“What’s he saying?”

“Hmm?” There’s a coy lilt to the syllable. He can hear the smirk behind it. “Ah, you know Hannibal. He drops fancy words left and right, but the gist is that you’re wonderful and he can’t wait to get his hands on you.”

Will laughs, embarrassed and pleased.

“He doesn’t actually say that second part.”

“Not to me,” Mischa chuckles. “He’s been gossiping with Bryn for the last half hour all about your dashing good looks. She’s quite the enabler.”

“Oh, is Bryn there?”

“She is. Abel came over with Bedelia for lunch, and Bryn got wind of it, so she invited herself along with Donald. Peculiar lot of people, really. Oh!” There’s a sound of quickened footsteps and a door opening and slamming. “Why don’t you come over and meet them? It’ll only be a few more hours of this, and I know they’re all frightfully curious about you.”

“Oh, well, I…” Abigail is still playing in the other room. “I live an hour out. I’d be a while getting up there.”

“We’ve kept all the schedules we needed to today. There will be more tomorrow,” she says lightly. “We have tonight to linger and idle.”

He considers it, imagines the night playing through in his head. It’ll bring him to Hannibal sooner if he just goes, and he’ll get to meet the band the way he’s wanted to for a few weeks now.

The door Mischa likely went through opens, and a voice that isn’t Hannibal’s says, “ _What are you doing out here by yourself?_ ”

“Inviting Will Graham to crash our lovely party.”

“ _Oh, **are** you?_ ” The voice laughs. “ _Does your brother know?_ ”

“I think I’d like for everyone to know _but_ my brother.”

“ _Oh, **please** can I be your accomplice?_ ”

“What do you say, Mr. Graham, hmm?”

Will shakes his head, lip bitten between his teeth. He laughs, softly. “He won’t be upset?”

“Oh, no, not my brother.”

“ _What’s he saying?_ ”

“He’s worried about upsetting Hannibal.”

“ _He’s brought it down on himself with his nonstop bragging._ ” The voice comes nearer to the phone, and Will is certain by the tone that it’s Don and not Abel. “He’ll be more charmed than upset, I promise. People don’t surprise him often enough.”

“This is true,” Mischa says, probably nodding.

“How far’s the drive from where you’re set up?”

Will says, “It’s about an hour.”

“Well, hell, that’s time enough to make my rounds.”

The door opens again. “ _Mischa, did—oh, you did take Bedelia’s phone._ ” The woman laughs. “ _She’s been turning Hannibal’s sofas inside out looking for it._ ”

Don snickers, and Mischa returns their subdued laughter with a hearty laugh of her own.

“ _What are you two doing standing around out here?_ ”

“We’re inviting Will to surprise Hannibal,” Don says immediately.

“ _Oh, that’s **brilliant,**_ ” Bryn says emphatically. “ _How can I help? Is he on the phone now?_ ”

Mischa tells her yes, and Bryn greets him, cheerfully but being careful not to speak too loudly.

“Hello, Mr. Graham!” She’s got the same funny lilt to her voice that Mischa had. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“We all have,” Don agrees. “Damned if I’m going back on the road without meeting the illustrious Will Graham.”

Will sighs, pings his gaze to the refrigerator with the roses inside. Nerves bloom anew. “Check with Bedelia and Abel before I make the trip, just to be on the safe side?”

“Yes, of course, Will,” Mischa says brightly. “I’ll text you.”

“Okay, Mischa.”

Don and Bryn exchange brief goodbyes as she’s hanging up. Will lowers his phone and rubs his thumbs over the screen aimlessly. He walks back into the den to find Abigail lying down on the couch with Madeline, the small white dog, on her stomach. The rose is on the coffee table next to her phone.

Looking up at him when he walks over she asks, “Change of plans?”

“We’ll see.” He tucks his phone into his pocket and sits on the arm of the couch. Madeline perks her head up at his arrival and trots clumsily over Abigail’s shoulder to investigate. He grins lopsidedly at the dog and scratches her ears. “Rude, Mads, shockingly rude.”

Abigail sits up.

“Are you still going to take the roses?”

“Yes,” Will sighs, though he half-wishes the answer was no.

She looks down to hide her smile, but it’s huge and Will sees it.

“You’re going to make a great second impression,” she says.

He swallows his reply when his phone buzzes in his pocket. “Jesus, that was quick.”

The text from the same number as before reads, _The band looks forward to meeting you, Mr. Graham. –B_

It’s probably Bedelia’s number. Will doesn’t text it back in case she doesn’t want him using her number, but he rolls the phone around in his hands a moment longer, considering and worrying.

“Do you think I should—”

“Yes, take the flowers,” Abigail laughs. “Take them, Mr. Graham. They’re all going to fall in love with you, and Hannibal will have to fight for your attention. It’ll be a great night.”

He slouches, watching her watch him with a warm, flighty ball of anxiety burbling in his gut.

“What are you going to do while I’m out?”

“Paint, maybe.” She shrugs. “Make something adventurous for dinner.”

“You don’t want to ask Marissa if she can come over?”

“No,” she murmurs. “Not tonight.”

“You call if you need anything.”

She smiles. “Yes, sir, Mr. Graham, sir.”

He retrieves the flowers from the fridge, works them back into the bag they came in, and heads for the car. He tries driving in silence for the first ten minutes, but the sounds of traffic all around aren’t busy enough to keep his mind from wandering. A few music stations call out to him as he’s blindly pressing buttons, and he ends up inexplicably on a station playing Christmas music.

It’s strange, but it gets him halfway to Baltimore with very little cognition outside of navigating the drive and humming “Let It Snow” ten minutes after the song has finished playing on the radio.

When he gets off the freeway, he’s singing the lyrics over commercials and drumming on the steering wheel. His windows are up, but he still gets looks. He’s so distracted by that point that when he turns onto Hannibal’s street he has to stop the car and get a hold of himself all over again.

“All right,” he says to himself, pulling out his phone to check for alerts. There’s nothing. “It’ll be all right.”

There are two cars in Hannibal’s driveway and one on the street. Will parks on the other side of the driveway on the curb and waits, turning off the car and taking deep breaths. The front door opens, and Mischa pokes her head out. He grabs the bouquet and marches toward her, head held high. Her eyes go straight to it and a wide grin blossoms across her face. It’s less wicked than it is endeared and pleasantly surprised.

“Did he see me coming?”

“Abel and Bryn lured him into the backyard. He’s none the wiser. Please, come in.”

He squeezes the plastic between his hands self-consciously, and Mischa gives him a warm look, knowing his mind and his heart.

“He’ll love them, Will. He’s a helpless romantic, my brother.”

Will laughs, “You wouldn’t think so to look at him.”

“To look at him one might think he’s in control of himself all the time,” she says, holding the door for him. “The precision is a mask. I hope you didn’t take it to be his true face.”

Her voice is casual but with the appropriate amount of tension underneath it to convey the full truth of the matter. He can tell she isn’t trying to scare him off. If she thought he hadn’t already known, she wouldn’t be telling him now. It would be badly done.

“Does he take it to be his true face?”

She stops to ponder, a thoughtful expression on her face. She turns it on him and tilts her head to one side.

“I like you more and more every day, Mr. Graham.”

Smiling, he says, “Likewise.”

A man emerges from the kitchen upon hearing their voices. Will recognizes him to be Don Sutcliffe and immediately extends his hand.

“Mr. Will Graham,” he observes, taking Will’s hand and shaking it once. He’s got a good grip, just on the comfortable side of firm. Bedelia Du Maurier emerges from the kitchen, a curious but guarded expression on her face. Don releases Will’s hand and looks over his shoulder. “Ah, and I’m sure this one needs no introduction.”

In a soft but cordial voice she says, “It’s a pleasure to see you again, Mr. Graham.”

“Yes, I’m sorry about my standoffishness the first time we met.” He smiles and shakes her hand. Gently, he adds, “And you have my condolences, for your father.”

Something in her jaw tightens at the same time that a soft smile flickers over her mouth. “Thank you.”

Breaking in at just the right moment, Don says, “So are those for me? Because honestly, Will, you shouldn’t have.”

Will looks dumbly at the bouquet in his hands and stammers.

Bedelia smirks at Don, something calm and comfortable settling back over her demeanor. Her voice is wistful when she tells him, “Someone will bring you roses someday, Don.”

“Well, whenever you want to get on that, Deely, baby.” Don winks at Will and gets his arm around Bedelia’s shoulders. She doesn’t shrug him off. His presence so near grounds her. Will understands the effect completely; the man reminds him a lot of Zeller. Don looks at Mischa. “Should I bring everyone else?”

Mischa turns to Will.

“You probably don’t want us all watching you with Hannibal when he sees that you’re here.”

Will’s face goes red. “Ah, no.”

She smiles. “Come with us outside to meet the others. We’ll give you a minute to get reacquainted.”

Will doesn’t say, _Oh, thank God_ like he wants to, but he does sigh loudly in show of his gratitude, and Mischa and Don both laugh good-naturedly at him. Bedelia smiles small, giving him a quizzical look. Will follows the familiar route through the kitchen to the backdoor and goes through when his three guides lag behind and give him various signs to go on without them. Will takes a deep breath and goes through the door, clutching the flowers in his hand like they’ll fly away if he loosens his grip even a little bit.

Bryn is just in the middle of telling a story that makes Hannibal laugh when the door closes quietly behind him. The solemn look on her face brightens at the sight of Will and she looks from Hannibal to Abel, who sees Will just a few seconds before Hannibal does.

He crushes the flower stems in his trembling hands. Hannibal’s looking at him with an expression of wonder and _delight._

His look says, _There you are_ in the simplest, most familiar way that almost has Will questioning why he wasn’t to begin with, why it took so long for him to get here—not even to Hannibal’s house, per se, but _here_ here, _with Hannibal_ here.

He licks his lips and barely registers Abel and Bryn silently making their way back to the house. Will takes a few shaky steps closer, and the door clicks shut behind him. Some birds sing, and a car engine up the street revs with gusto. He keeps walking, slow steps that become confident as he settles into his stride. Will comes to stand directly in front of Hannibal, eyes pinging all over his face, and comes to a natural, lilting stop.

“Will,” Hannibal whispers, the word transforming his mouth into a smile as it leaves his lips.

Will grins, the same hush affecting his voice. “Hannibal.”

Hannibal reaches up to touch Will’s face, to draw his thumb from Will’s temple to the flat of his jaw. He fixes his eyes on Will’s, dark eyes, hungry but too overwhelmed to choose a starting point. Will drops the bouquet and winds his arms around Hannibal’s waist, pressing his face into Hannibal’s neck and breathing deeply until Will’s sure his nose won’t immediately forget the scent there, like mint and traces of cigarette smoke, a different, more succulent smell than the cherry flavor Will remembers.

His forehead fits the curve beneath Hannibal’s jaw; his arms reach perfectly around the circle of Hannibal’s torso. Hannibal holds him back, shifting minutely to nose around Will’s ear. He bites his lip when Hannibal’s fingers thread through his hair and his other hand comes to rest comfortably in between Will’s shoulders.

Hannibal starts to lean back, brushing his cheek with Will’s and his hair with Will’s and his nose with Will’s. Their lips touch, and Will’s eyes fall closed around a sigh. He fists his hands in the back of Hannibal’s shirt and leans into the kiss. Hannibal’s fingers move slowly through Will’s hair, tickling with his nails all down his scalp and jolting him right in his belly when he catches on the occasional tangles. He changes the angle and kisses Will again, softly, hand leaving his hair in favor of his neck. Will licks his lips and opens his mouth when Hannibal kisses him a third time.

It’s so easy kissing Hannibal. It’s the easiest thing in the world. Will loses himself in it, it feels so good and effortless. He pulls away to breathe, and once his head clears he remembers that he has things to tell Hannibal, so _many_ things that aren’t quite for now but that will come later when they’re really alone. Hannibal has things to tell him, too. He has stories upon stories to share and jokes to tell and compromises to negotiate. He has a brush set from L’Eliografica in Milan to send home with Will for Abigail. 

Will smiles when Hannibal starts leaving butterfly kisses from his cheek to his hairline. He laughs when Hannibal nuzzles him, arms enfolding him tightly and leaving not a single question in Will’s mind about whether he’s upset about the band’s surprising him in this way.

He presses a kiss to Hannibal’s jaw and says, “I brought you flowers.”

“They’re beautiful,” Hannibal mumbles in answer, turning and kissing the apple of Will’s cheek near his eye socket. Will can feel his eyelashes brushing Hannibal’s lips when he closes his eyes. He turns so his forehead presses against Hannibal’s. “You’re beautiful, Will.”

Will opens his eyes lazily and stares back at Hannibal, catalogues his breathless gratitude and his glossy eyes and the open, blissful smile on his face. It isn’t polished or controlled. It’s a scattered brand of happiness existing in a moment to be sustained or let go as circumstances will it. Will stares at all that he can find and at everything he can’t because it simply isn’t there. What he doesn’t see is a mask.

“I love you,” Will reminds him—and it is a reminder. It isn’t said to validate his presence here or for the great privilege of having been the first to say it in person.

Hannibal beams and kisses him once, chastely, on the mouth. “I love you,” he says against Will’s lips.

Will presses back a few times, stealing the kisses that belong to him and have been away from him for too long. Hannibal drops his hands from the perches on Will’s neck and shoulder. His left hand finds Will’s right, and their fingers slot easily together.

“They’re going to give us hell when we get back inside.”

“Of course,” Hannibal agrees, nodding cheerfully. “Would you prefer they ignore us entirely?”

“I’d prefer to just kiss you for hours on end.”

Hannibal chuckles, a low sound that calls to mind the taste of chocolate. “Yes, and I you.”

He bends to quickly retrieve the fallen flowers with his free hand and examines the red flowers with the concentration of a child examining a completely new discovery. His lips quirk. He says, “Eleven?”

“Abigail picked one for herself,” Will explains. The amused expression on Hannibal’s face softens, amused still but also tender. “She insisted I give those eleven to you, thorns and all.”

Hannibal smiles. “She’s a very bright girl.”

Will takes a step forward to kiss Hannibal swiftly and gently on the mouth. He takes another step around him to lead him back toward the house, and Hannibal goes with him readily. It’s at the threshold when Hannibal tugs on his hand to make him stop. With a grave look on his face Hannibal starts to warn him, “If at any point you begin to feel uncomfortable…”

“I remember my safe word, Hannibal,” Will tells him, tone light but suggestive. He drops his eyes to Hannibal’s lips and then to his throat and licks his lips, careful not to be too overt about this posturing for the sake of flustering Hannibal—if it’s even possible by this point. “I say that word, and the knot comes free, remember?”

Hannibal’s Adam’s apple bobs once when he swallows. His voice is beautifully hoarse when he replies, “I remember.”

Will brings his eyes back up to Hannibal’s, gone attractively dark for Will’s teasing. A gorgeous red tint fills out across the midway point of his face, all across the bridge of his nose and the mounds of his cheekbones. Will smiles and laughs when Hannibal leans in abruptly for another kiss. It’s messier and worlds lovelier for it. Will has half a mind to be embarrassed for their possible audience inside, but he pushes the niggling thought to the back of his mind. He steadies Hannibal with one hand to his flank when he pulls away.

“We’re going to be all right,” he tells him.

The corners of Hannibal’s eyes wrinkle. He hasn’t let go of Will’s hand since he first captured it with his own.

“Yes, I believe we will be.”

Will grins, bends down quickly to retrieve the flowers _Hannibal_ dropped, and gently hands them over for the second time. Hannibal takes them, and Will has the very clear thought that he should always gift Hannibal with beautiful things.

“Are you ready?”

Hannibal gives Will a small, secretive smile. He squeezes Will’s hand and says, “Yes.”

Will reaches out to open the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Leeds and Jacobi families are from Thomas Harris’ _Red Dragon._
> 
> “Golden Ticket” from Roald Dahl’s _Charlie and the Chocolate Factory._
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> Sergei Rachmaninoff: 1st Piano Sonata Opus 28 Movement 1
> 
> From Bryan Fuller’s _Hannibal_ (S1 E4, _Oeuf_ ): “Rude, Hannibal, shockingly rude!”
> 
> From Jane Austen’s _Emma_ “It was badly done, indeed.”


	19. Going Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will hangs out with Nemean Lion, briefly, and spends some alone time (FINALLY) with his man.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Spendin’ too much time away / I can’t stand another day / Maybe you think I’ve seen the world / But I’d rather see my girl_
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> Bottom!Hannibal featuring in this chapter.

The kitchen is empty when they go inside. Hannibal breaks away from Will for just a moment to tuck the flowers into a tasteful vase on the counter and then rejoins with him. They get distracted, slightly, when Will steals a kiss off Hannibal’s neck and Hannibal retaliates by leaning down to bite Will’s ear.

Really, Will’s impressed they made it through the kitchen without having to stop. He’s probably pressing his luck, but he’s kissing Hannibal after weeks of not kissing Hannibal and it’s just _so nice_ to be kissing Hannibal.

Maybe he gets a little greedy about it after the fourth one.

It’s a miracle nobody walks by and catches them at it, but they break apart before they can be discovered. Will’s flushed when they get to the library, half of Hannibal’s guests sitting or standing and chatting quietly.

“Bryn went with Abel to the studio,” Mischa tells Hannibal. “He wanted to play the piano proper since Donald always insists on commandeering the harpsichord.”

Don turns upon hearing his name, an impish look about him that has Will curious. It calls to mind what Mischa said about him ending up in various people’s laps just out of happenstance.

“My God,” he muses, “look at that glow.”

Bedelia chuckles from her place by the window on the other side of the room, but she doesn’t turn to interject.

Hannibal glares in the man’s general direction and tugs at Will’s hand, alerting him to the fact that they are still, in fact, holding hands. Will swallows through his smile and goes with him to sit on the couch. Mischa’s stepping out of the room in the next instant, presumably to go and tell Bryn and Abel they’ve returned from their excursion outside.

“So you’re a teacher then,” Don says, swiveling around in his seat at the harpsichord. “You teach kids exclusively or anyone that shows up for lessons?”

“The latter,” Will answers. “I’ve taught for small groups, but mostly I do private tutoring.”

“Oh, that’s right,” Don starts to say and then stops short. He looks embarrassed, briefly. Hannibal goes rigid at his side. “I mean, because…that’s…where the money is, obviously.”

Bryn asks from the door as she’s breezing into the room, “Where’s that, Don?”

The word bursts from him, “Teaching!”

Abel makes a face, asks, “Are you sure?”

Will turns to look at Hannibal while Don busies himself with an explanation and lowers his voice to say, “What just happened?”

Hannibal opens his mouth to answer but stops, eyes sliding away from Will’s face and up. Will turns and sees Bryn approaching with Abel several steps behind her. He stands to shake her hand.

“We’ve genuinely not met yet, hello,” she says, beaming and giving him a firm handshake.

“No,” Will agrees. “You’re Bryn Fuller.”

“Yes.” She grins and takes her hand back, stepping to one side so Abel can come forward and shake Will’s hand, too. “And Abel; he tells me you’ve spoken, peripherally.”

Will thinks back, remembers Abel’s voice telling him, _It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Graham._

He chuckles and takes Abel’s hand, recalling Hannibal’s answer: _…knowing your allergies is the same thing as knowing how to inexpensively poison you._

“Yes, I remember.”

“Everyone’s memory is better than Hannibal’s,” Abel muses, drawling in a manner that is very befitting to him. His eyes shine, more an expression of curiosity than mischievous intent. “Isn’t that peculiar?”

“I’m surprised any of you remember me from four years ago,” Will retorts, speaking first so Hannibal won’t have to make an excuse. “It was completely unremarkable the way it happened.”

“Maybe your meeting was,” Bedelia agrees, coming from the window to stand at Don’s shoulder near the harpsichord. “The night itself was a memorable one—your lecture, included.”

Will watches the frown flicker over Hannibal’s mouth.

“What else happened that night?”

Bedelia’s gaze shifts from Will to Hannibal, confusion etched into her expression and then concern. Will notices the exact moment she backs away from the topic, though it doesn’t happen all at once. It’s gradual, and he’s sure it’s done intentionally so as to keep Hannibal from alerting to her retreat. The effect on the atmosphere in the room itself is minimal, but Will feels it like a siren’s call.

A smirk flutters over her mouth, part of the clever diversion. “Frederick Chilton, Hannibal?”

It’s a good answer; it even catches Will’s attention. As a distraction it’s less effective, though it does the trick for Hannibal. He leans back into the couch, sighs, and generally looks very put out. “I found his attentions endearing.”

“You would, you drama queen,” Don teases as he’s standing from the bench at the harpsichord. Will catches Bedelia looking just away from him. “Fronting a band would be bad for your ego.”

Hannibal rolls his eyes. “Lucky for all of you I have no desire to front a band—least of all Nemean Lion.”

“I’ll drink to that, berniklitė.”

Will looks up over his shoulder where Mischa’s voice has migrated behind the couch. She leans down over the back and winds her arms around Hannibal’s front. Her chin drops onto his shoulder and from that vantage point she gives Will a big, happy smile. Will’s genuinely amazed she’s only a few years younger than Hannibal and not a whole decade. Hannibal moves both hands to hold her arms in place and turns to kiss her cheek.

It’s impossible not to smile at them, especially when Mischa gives Will a conspiratorial look and calculatedly probes Hannibal’s ribs with her fingers. He jolts in response and blindly reaches overhead, maybe her for shoulder or her neck. Will laughs and doesn’t move out of the way quickly enough to avoid having Mischa fall on him when Hannibal pulls her over the back of the couch.

“I have a better idea of how we all fell asleep on the same bed back in Bergen,” Will hears someone say, maybe Don.

Mischa’s slack at first and very light. Her legs are thrown out over Will’s lap, in a heap and then crossed neatly at the ankles. She giggles—there is actually no other way to describe how she says it, “Fancy meeting you like this, Will.”

He shakes his head, out of breath from laughing so hard.

“Fancy learning about your brother’s ticklish spot,” he says, looking from Mischa to Hannibal. The raised eyebrow on his face is a challenge that he doesn’t mean to accept now but that he will at the next opportunity.

“Oh, the things I could teach you, Mr. Graham.”

“The things any of us could teach you,” Bryn scoffs, sitting down on the arm of Abel’s plush armchair. “There’s also a spot on the back of his neck that he’s very—”

“Bryn,” Hannibal stops her.

“Did I say on the back of his neck? I actually meant the soles of his feet, they’re very—”

“ _Bryn Fuller._ ”

She laughs, leaning sideways to drape her arms across Abel’s shoulders.

Don gets in on the action as he’s making for the writing desk in the corner where he’s got a bottle of water waiting for him. “You didn’t even mention his knees! What’s that about?”

Smiling, Will asks Hannibal, “Your knees are ticklish?”

“I will murder you, Donald Sutcliffe.”

“Oh, you’ve been saying that for years.” Don dismisses him with a wave of his hand. “Don’t listen to him, Will. He’s as docile as a baby lamb.”

Hannibal covers his face with one hand. Mischa rolls her eyes at him and starts to extract herself from the couch. With a wink at Will, she says, “I told you one of us would end up in your lap before the night was through.”

Bryn laughs, shooting Don an entertained look. He grins at Abel, who frowns in turn.

“You’re a very comfortable man, Abel, what can I say?”

“You don’t differentiate when you’re asleep,” Abel says ominously as he’s digging his phone out of his pocket to show Bryn.

Will is about to ask why she’s smiling fondly at the phone when Hannibal hands him his phone with a picture queued up of Don’s face buried in Abel’s neck. Hannibal nods when Will gives him a questioning look with his thumb poised over the screen. The next few photos are random candid shots of the band and a countryside, presumably that of Norway. He swipes back to the photo of Don and Abel; the previous cluster of photos shows the entirety of Nemean Lion—minus Abel, who’s manning the camera—sleeping in a shared, pretty sizeable bed.

Don has his arm around Hannibal’s waist in these ones. Everyone’s out cold except Hannibal, though he looks like foggy like he’s only just woken up.

Will chuckles, “Do I want to know how this happened?”

Hannibal shrugs, and outside of their bubble, vaguely, Will can hear Mischa and the band having a conversation separate from their own. “Grief does strange things to people.”

Will nods, leaning back against the couch finally. “It does.”

There’s a calm smile on Hannibal’s face that Will wants to touch, kiss, watch forever. He settles for angling his shoulders just enough for them to brush Hannibal’s. The smile on his face widens, and he casually stretches an arm around Will’s back to gently hold his shoulder. It brings them in closer to each other in funny, comfortable ways.

Curious, he slips his hand over Hannibal’s knee and gives him an experimental squeeze, marveling and barking a laugh when Hannibal buckles forward and grabs his wrist. A breathless, amazed laugh startles past Hannibal’s lips, and he pins Will with an astounded, entertained expression on his face.

He’s just about to lean in and kiss Hannibal, audience or no audience, when he hears Don say, “Hey, lovebirds.”

They both turn and look. Will’s face grows warm immediately at his knee-jerk (ha-ha) response. Hannibal’s fingers relax against his wrist but don’t draw away.

“We’re heading out. Gonna get dinner somewhere. You want in?”

Hannibal looks at Will, so Will turns to Don and says, “Rain check okay?”

“Oh, you bet.” He winks. “Bring some friends with you next time so we can embarrass both of you.”

“Donald,” Bedelia chides him, bumping her shoulder against his.

“What? It would be fun, I bet. We could make an event of it.” He wags his eyebrows at Hannibal. “There’ll be time to figure out the details, at least.”

Will’s stomach sinks, remembering the second half of the tour after France. He brightens instantly, remembering that he’ll be back for _two weeks_ before the rest of the tour commences. Hannibal stands, so Will stands, too, to see them out.

He checks his watch as he’s following them out into the hallway and decides they’re probably leaving for dinner this side of too early to give Will and Hannibal time alone together. It’s enough that they all got to meet, officially, and they have been over since lunchtime after all. He hangs back in the foyer while Hannibal takes up his station by the door. Don pats Will familiarly on the shoulder as he’s getting his jacket back on; Abel nods once in his direction before pulling Mischa aside for a word.

“Under different circumstances we’d stick around and give you a hard time all night, let Don have a chance to fall into your lap properly,” Bryn coos at him as she takes his hand for the second time today. She winks. “Circumstances will be different next time.”

“He’ll get his chance,” he agrees, quietly unalarmed by his conviction and how naturally it flows.

She doesn’t appear to be thrown by it either. Rather the smile on her face grows and she gives him a quick hug that he almost doesn’t have time to respond to.

“Take care of our Hanny then,” she says near his ear in a confidential voice, and then she’s gone, twirling out the front door right on Don’s heels.

Abel goes to speak with Hannibal by the door with Mischa’s arm looped through his when Bedelia finds him. Her coat is folded neatly over her arm and a serious expression is written over her face. For a moment he worries that he’s done something, but she touches his arm, steps in, and kisses him briefly on the cheek.

He stares, at a loss. It’s not an incredibly intimate thing the way she does it, but it’s more than he had thought to expect from her so soon. Abel’s watching them from the door, but his expression is softer than Bedelia’s. Mischa and Hannibal are looking at each other, and they don’t notice their exchange. Before that can change, Abel shifts his gaze back to Mischa, smiles, and says something that makes Hannibal laugh and Mischa elbow him in the ribs.

“Don’t ask him about what happened that night,” Bedelia warns him evenly. “Don’t ask him to remember.”

“I…” He looks away from Mischa to Bedelia, blinks. “Was it something bad?”

“There was a situation,” she answers measuredly. “Had it escalated, things could have become much worse. Please,” she intones with a slow shake of her head, “don’t remind him.”

“But—”

Louder, she says, “It was lovely seeing you again, Mr. Graham.”

“Bedelia…”

“Maybe you’ll bring your friend from the club with you when you collect on that rain check.”

He frowns, confused, and she turns in a single, brusque move that confirms the few suspicions he’s had thus far about her personality. Will thinks back to that first night at La Fin Absolue du Monde.

“Wait, Price?”

“The scruffy one,” she says as Hannibal’s leaning down to kiss her hair on her way out.

He lets that sink in and blurts out, “ _Zeller?_ ”

She gives him a final parting glance, both fondly amused and subtly cautionary. Abel leaves with her, and Mischa spins around to wrap Will up in a quick, solid hug. He huffs a laugh, returns the embrace, and smiles when she stands on tip-toes to kiss her brother on the cheek after they’ve released each other. Hannibal bars his arm across her back and responds by leaving a kiss on her forehead.

“Iki, brolite. Myliu tave.”

“Tave myliu, sesute. Viso gero.”

She sings, “Bye, Will.”

“Bye, Mischa.”

He smiles and waves when she glances his way over her shoulder on her way down the drive. Don is bent at the waist leaning into the opened window of Abel’s car talking to Bedelia in Hannibal’s driveway. Bryn turns to receive Mischa when she makes her way over.

“You don’t want to go mingle?” Will asks when Hannibal goes to shut the door.

“They won’t leave if we mingle,” Hannibal murmurs, easing his arm around Will’s back and tugging him close.

Will laughs but accepts the burning kiss Hannibal gives him. He backs away and Hannibal follows him until they’re pressed up against the wall.

“Christ,” he murmurs when Hannibal moves away from his mouth to brush his cheek and jaw with soft, warm lips. “You’re just going to ravish me in the hallway?”

“Why not?” Hannibal bends down to kiss his neck, and Will’s complaints vanish into thin air. He drops his head back so it thumps the wall. In between a series of soft bites, Hannibal whispers, “Careful.”

“Easier said than done,” Will breathes around a grin, insinuating his hands under Hannibal’s shirt. “There’s no way to be careful around you.”

Hannibal’s hands slide along Will’s hips and squeeze. “Should I take that as a compliment?”

“Uh, sure.” Will licks his lips and gets his fingers in Hannibal’s hair. “Sure, yes. Yeah.”

Hannibal goes to say something, but Will stops him with a kiss. The words he meant to say don’t struggle to be spoken. Will’s just about to start divesting Hannibal of his clothes when there’s a knock on the door that forces reality to rush back over him in relentless waves. He leans back just enough to disconnect their mouths but makes no move to remove his arms from around Hannibal’s shoulders.

“Yes?” Hannibal sighs, taking one of his hands off Will’s hip to rub at his forehead.

“I forgot my keys because I’m a genius,” Don shouts through the door.

Hannibal groans and moves to get the door. Something about their appearance tips Don off about what they were just doing before Hannibal let him in. Will checks, and yes, Hannibal is pleasantly, obviously ruffled. He can imagine how he himself looks.

Don just smirks at Hannibal’s deep frown and says, so naturally nonchalant that Will envies him, “They’re probably in the library. I’ll just get them and be on my merry way.”

Will flushes when Don turns that wickedly pleased smirk on him but holds his ground. Outside he sees Abel driving off with Bedelia and waves. Mischa’s car is still parked in the driveway; she’s waiting with Bryn for Don to get his keys.

Hannibal goes through the kitchen to check the backyard for Don’s keys in case they’re not in the library. The backdoor swings shut and Will takes his phone out of his pocket to text Zeller what Bedelia said about him.

_Any chance you, Bev, and Price would want to have lunch or dinner sometime with Nemean Lion?_

He hears Don crooning, indiscernibly at first but gradually louder so that he can make out the words.

“…a song that grows from my tender sentimental woes. That was my heart trying to compose a prelude to a kiss.”

Will listens as his footsteps move from the library toward the kitchen. His phone buzzes in his pocket in time with the door opening and two sets of feet stuttering against the tile.

_**If you’re pulling my leg right now I will end you.** _

Will laughs and checks the message from Beverly when it buzzes through.

_**Perks of dating a rock star ;)** _

He types back, _Jazz and blues, with the occasional twist of classical. And sometimes classic rock._

The footsteps come closer and Don resumes singing, louder this time, though Hannibal’s right behind him.

“Though it’s just a simple melody with nothing fancy, nothing much.” He sweeps back into the foyer, grinning and winking at Will as he breezes past him and lets himself out. The song persists through the closed door. “You could turn it to a symphony, a Shubert tune with a Gershwin touch…”

“He’s incorrigible,” Will remarks, smiling and embarrassed.

“He is himself.” Hannibal shrugs, moving to lock the door. “He’ll sing for any and all occasions, I’ve found.”

“What if nothing’s happening?”

“He’ll invent something to sing about.”

Will bites his lip and pushes off the wall to cross the foyer. He comes to stand in front of Hannibal and throws his arms around his neck, pulls him down for a chaste kiss that Hannibal doesn’t try to deepen beyond winding his arms behind Will’s back and holding him close. Warmth blossoms in his belly, and he breaks the kiss. His phone buzzes in his pocket.

“I think my friends will like your friends,” Will says by way of explanation.

Hannibal smiles, leans in for a lingering kiss. “Do you?”

“Yes.” Will runs one hand through Hannibal’s hair, down the back of his neck. “They met briefly, at La Fin Absolue du Monde.”

Hannibal’s eyes drop to his lips, and he loses his breath around the next press of lips that’s only just insistent for all its heat.

Will chuckles, catching his breath. “What did I say?”

“I like the way French sounds rolling off your tongue.”

“Well, likewise.”

Hannibal smiles and murmurs, “Vraiment?”

“Mais oui, vraiment,” Will whispers back, nerves and amusement and joy making him giddy right in the pit of his stomach. “C’est beau.”

“Très beau.” Hannibal draws Will’s bottom lip in between his teeth and then sucks it into his mouth.

Will moans, low and soft. It’s the only verbal encouragement he can give at a disadvantage. He sighs when Hannibal lets go of his lip and chases after his mouth with hungry lips and a questing tongue.

Hannibal does manage to ask, as Will’s backing him into the wall, “Are you hungry, Will?”

“Ravenous,” he says on an exhale when the wall comes up hard and fast under Hannibal’s back.

He presses up into Will, arching his back and brushing him with his knee up the outside of the leg. Will reads that gesture as a hint, takes that leg in hand, and leans down to retrieve the other so he can lift Hannibal off the ground and pin him in between the wall and his body. He’s heavy, but Will likes it, the weight of him. He likes that he feels strong holding Hannibal like this, that gravity is made real in the very physical way they defy it with this singular act, that Hannibal lets him do it at all.

And Hannibal’s nothing if not equally aroused by it. For all that Will may have perceived control and authority to be among Hannibal’s top priorities, he enjoys being handled every bit as much as he enjoys sitting in the driver’s seat. It’s heady just how much he likes it.

“I wouldn’t have guessed,” Will pants against Hannibal’s cheek, worked up and fully clothed and unsure what exactly to do about any of it. Hannibal touches his shoulder, plants his other hand on the wall, and rolls his hips into Will’s once, perhaps sensing that Will needs a push to make a decision. Will has to brace himself with a hand on the wall and another on Hannibal’s hip. “Yeah?”

God, he sounds desperate.

“Yes, Will,” Hannibal sighs, pressing his head back against the wall. He licks his lips and swallows. “Yes.”

Will bends his head and shapes his lips around Hannibal’s Adam’s apple. “We need to talk after, about everything we said we’d talk about.”

Hannibal’s fingers work through Will’s hair, nails gently scratching his nape when he gets there. “We’ll talk about all of it.”

He nods and starts to set Hannibal down but thinks better of it. “Where? Tell me where to go.”

“Upstairs.”

“I don’t trust myself to carry you up the stairs,” Will protests, leaning in to nip at Hannibal’s earlobe and sigh into his hairline, kiss his temple. “And I can’t bear to put you down.”

“The den,” Hannibal sighs, tightening his legs around Will’s waist and pushing off the wall. “On the other side of the studio down the hall.”

“There are so many rooms in this house.”

Will makes quickly for the studio, trusting that he’ll know the door when he sees it at the end of the hall. Sure enough he does, though Hannibal makes it very difficult for him to walk in a straight line what with the attention he’s lavishing on his neck. He catches his elbow on the doorframe as he’s crossing the threshold and all but stumbles towards the long, low-backed sofa pushed up into the corner of the room.

A full breath shoots past Hannibal’s lips when Will falls on top of him, and they laugh, breathless by the endeavor.

“That’s for dropping your sister on my head.”

“She’s lighter than I am,” Hannibal muses, laying his head back on the cushion and looking up at Will. His knees draw up and bracket Will’s sides. The hum on Hannibal’s lips makes Will’s skin buzz. “Lighter than you, too.”

“Carried you in here, didn’t I?” Will smiles and moves in close to kiss Hannibal on the lips. His legs lift off the couch and wind slowly around Will’s waist. The couch is cool and smooth under his fingers when he lays his arm flat above Hannibal’s head. He plucks at Hannibal’s buttons with his other hand.

Hannibal works at Will’s belt. “You’re very strong.”

“Thank you,” he mumbles, dropping his head to touch the peacock on Hannibal’s chest with his lips.

The heartbeat there is steady, if a little fast.

Will swallows and gets Hannibal’s shirt opened all the way just as his belt is sliding out of the loops in his jeans. “Tell me you have things in here.”

“Lubricant,” Hannibal tells him, sliding his hands up his chest and deftly undoing Will’s buttons. “No condoms.”

“Um…” Will twists around a bit, reaching over Hannibal’s leg for his back pocket. He mumbles, “Wallet.”

Understanding, Hannibal eases his legs back a bit to accommodate for Will’s search. He procures the tricky thing and flips through it. One of these days he’s going to have to sacrifice a prize bull in honor of his high school health teacher who warned his ninth grade class, gravely, that they should always carry protection on their persons, just in case.

_Thank you, Mr. Mikkelsen._

He promptly tells himself, once he’s wrestled the little packet out of his wallet, that he will never, ever think that phrase again while in bed with someone, ever again.

“I love you,” Hannibal says, relieved that they won’t have to go searching his house.

Will smiles, tosses the thing onto the couch above Hannibal’s shoulder, and kisses his exposed clavicle. Hannibal works his shirt off of him in the meantime. “Where do you keep the lube?”

He points. “Desk—bottom drawer on the right-hand side.”

The displeased noise he makes when Will slips off of him to retrieve said lube is actually adorable. Will finds the stuff easily enough and steps out of his shoes and socks while he’s on his feet. Hannibal sits up and mirrors his actions, tucking one sock into his shoe before dropping it neatly onto the floor and repeating the process with his second shoe. Will just watches him, curious and deeply, quaintly enamored.

“Meticulous, aren’t you?”

“Meticulous would be insisting that we lay a sheet down before ruining the upholstery,” Hannibal muses, lying back down when Will comes to sit on the edge of the couch.

“Did you think about it?”

“I did, yes.”

Will huffs a laugh, runs an aimless hand up Hannibal’s thigh.

“Should I go get one?”

Now Hannibal laughs, throwing his arm over his eyes. His other hand is draped over the peacock’s throat.

“It was going so well.”

“It is going well,” Will corrects him, gently taking his arm away from his face and bringing his hand to his lips. “Where can I get a sheet?”

Hannibal watches him, first bewildered and then purely stunned. Something beautiful and vulnerable shudders over his expression, and then Hannibal is pushing to sit up and he’s kissing Will fiercely on the mouth.

“Sheets, Hannibal,” he gasps, breaking away when his resolve to physically leave this room for anything starts to fizzle out.

“Linen closet, in between the library and the bathroom.”

Will nods, brushing his forehead with Hannibal’s and making himself very woozy before he can make himself stand and go hunting for a bed sheet. The closet is just where Hannibal said it would be, right across the hall from the den and down a ways. He grabs the first one he sees and dashes madly for the opened door he left behind him to find Hannibal standing, completely naked, folding his shirt and dropping it in a neat pile with the rest of his clothes.

He looks right at Will, ashamed of nothing and making no attempt to hide anything. Will comes forward and hands off the sheets when Hannibal holds his hands out for them.

It feels rude to stare, even if Hannibal is naked for the purpose of them having glorious, fantastic, delicious sex.

Will looks at the room instead. There’s light coming in through the deep tan slots of the blinds on all the windows in the den. There are dark burgundy drapes framing the windows, but they’re tied up so they don’t block or tint the light. Mostly they’re decorative. The blinds keep this room private, isolated, but they allow also for some natural daylight to seep in and illuminate their surroundings anyway.

Hannibal sits when he’s laid the sheet out the way he likes. Will watched him do it twice in his peripheral vision.

He turns, prepared to take a seat beside him, when Hannibal’s hand slides across his bare stomach. Will stays where he is and lets Hannibal lead him in between his legs. The warmth from before that pulsed in him like a livewire thrums. Hannibal presses lazy kisses into his skin and gently undoes the fly on Will’s jeans, tugging them down with one deliberate yank.

There’s no real way to prepare for it when Hannibal slides his boxers down his legs and looks up the length of his body as he’s touching him, as he’s leaning in, as he’s pressing a soft kiss to his cock.

Will sucks in a breath like a drowning man. “Hannibal.”

“Yes, darling?” Hannibal blinks up at him, eyes unfocused and cheeks and neck a deep reddish-pink.

“Lie down.”

Hannibal does and Will follows him onto the couch. The sheet feels cooler under his palm than the upholstery did. It rustles when they move. He’s prepared to enjoy that quite a lot.

Will takes up the little bottle he’d acquired from the desk and squeezes some out into his hand, imagining the uses Hannibal had for it in this secluded room tucked away into the corner of his house. He’s actually glad, thrilled, that Hannibal doesn’t keep condoms in here. This room isn’t maintained for spontaneous bouts of sexual intercourse. It’s a room he keeps for himself, when he’s _by himself._

And he let Will carry him into it and laid down a sheet to protect the couch from their rough housing.

He’s glad they already had their epiphanies about love and need; he doesn’t want to stop for anything now.

Hannibal’s quiet when he starts in on him, moving slowly with his first finger and kissing Hannibal’s thigh, hip, and pubis. He takes his time getting to Hannibal’s cock, just kissing the tip and flicking his tongue across the head when his finger pushes inside and circles once before pulling back out. He hears Hannibal hiss when he pushes in deeper and eases the pressure in accordingly.

He has to flirt with Hannibal’s body a bit to get two fingers in at once, but it’s worth it for the sound that ruptures out of Hannibal’s throat. It’s broken and unfettered; it makes Will’s skin break out into goose bumps.

“Fuck, Hannibal,” he mumbles into Hannibal’s hip.

Hannibal clutches blindly at the sheet. “Please.”

“Give it a minute,” Will coos, running his hand up Hannibal’s stomach and over his ribs until Hannibal catches his hand between trembling fingers. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

Hannibal groans, stretching his neck to lay his head back, “I’ve been hurt, it doesn’t matter.”

“Of course it matters,” Will objects softly, working his fingers slowly in and out, applying pressure and twisting where he thinks the more pleasant sensations will hit Hannibal the strongest. “I told you I’d take care of you, didn’t I?”

The hum he receives in answer is interested. It lifts at the end, an invitation to tell more about it. Will accepts.

“Said I’d make you feel good when you came home to me, remember?”

He looks up when Hannibal doesn’t answer and finds his eyes searching the ceiling.

“Hannibal?”

There’s a pause and he stills his fingers. Hannibal breathes out unevenly, says, “Yes, Will.”

Will withdraws his fingers and crawls up the length of Hannibal’s body to kiss him. It takes a few long moments, but Hannibal relaxes. He drops his shoulders and sighs, stares blearily at Will’s cheek and then into his eyes. There’s a lot there that Will doesn’t dare to touch, it runs so deep. He isn’t sure it’s for him yet. 

“What is it?”

“It’s been a long time for me, since the last time.”

“Do you want me to stop?”

“No.” Hannibal licks his lips, winds his arm around Will’s neck. “Could…” He stops and looks away.

“Hannibal, what?” Will whispers, pressing his forehead against Hannibal’s temple. “Tell me, please.”

“Could you stay, right here,” he says haltingly.

Will’s jaw drops, which he corrects by diving down to claim Hannibal’s lips with his. Their mouths are patient and testing at first. Very quickly they become hotter, greedier, hungrier. Will waits until Hannibal’s gasping just from the touch of his lips to move his hand back down between Hannibal’s legs.

“Just keep,” he pants, gently nudging Hannibal’s thigh when it gets in the way. “Yeah, li-like that. Yes.”

He can’t help that he ruts back a little bit when Hannibal presses up into him. It’s wonderful that way, even though his fingers cramp slightly at the angle. Determination wins out, though, and he manages a third finger, aided by the even undulations of their bodies. It lights the fire in Will’s gut and makes Hannibal loud; first his breathing goes heavy and labored, and then his gasps become grunts, his sighs become groaned pleas.

“Will,” Hannibal pants into his mouth. “Will, please.”

“Yes,” Will exclaims, nodding. “Okay, okay, yes.”

He roots around in the bunched up mess of sheet for the condom and tears into it. After getting it in place, he drizzles more of the lube onto his cock and quickly lines himself up. It’s as he’s carefully guiding himself in that Hannibal swears and fists his hand in Will’s hair, nails scraping roughly at his scalp.

“Mother of—” Hannibal’s voice cuts out when Will moves back and pushes back in. “ _Dievas._ ”

Through his teeth, Will asks him, “All right?”

“Yes.” Hannibal loosens his grip in Will’s hair. “Yes.”

Will moves his hips a few times, testing whether it’s okay for Hannibal. This takes time and kisses, too, but gradually Hannibal’s body relaxes and opens for him, sweetly and verging on something tender like timidity.

His knees tease up around Will’s waist again and his hips rise to meet with him, clumsy for all of five seconds before finding his rhythm and matching it. A moan loses itself in between their mouths. Hannibal’s hands scramble for purchase on his back, sweating palms on burning skin. Will squeezes his fingers into a fist around the sheet and moves faster, harder, noisy grunts absorbing into Hannibal’s shoulder.

“Hannibal,” he cries out on the tail end of a moan.

His call is answered with another just like it, his name carried on a moan tripping off Hannibal’s tongue. It’s all they’re capable of saying. The entirety of all their language devolves into the other’s name, sometimes branching out into simple sentences but never getting very far.

“Will, Will, I…I—”

“What?” He bites Hannibal’s shoulder, clutches at his hip and at the low back of the couch a ways behind Hannibal’s head. “What, baby?”

“Touch me.”

Will does. He reaches down, takes Hannibal’s cock in his hand. It drives him a little crazy just having him in his hand with the way he’s wound up so tightly now, with how frantically the climax is building up in him the closer he gets.

“Goddamn,” Will mutters, nipping at Hannibal’s neck, his chin, his jaw, his ear. “God _damn_ it, Hannibal.”

Hannibal’s back bows off the couch, and he comes in Will’s hand. He shudders with his whole body, squeezing his legs around Will’s waist and moaning while his orgasm passes through him. Will slows down, squeezing him in his hand and pressing inside of him one more time before easing to a stop. He drops his forehead into the curve between Hannibal’s neck and shoulder and breathes.

They lie still for a while until Hannibal’s hand drops from his hair to his shoulder. He says, slurring, “You didn’t…”

“No,” Will sighs, smiling faintly. “It’s still just there,” he says inarticulately around a swallow and a quick inhale to fill his empty lungs. “I can…”

Hannibal pushes him back gently so he slides out of him and rolls them over. He tucks his chin over Will’s shoulder, sighs against his throat, and reaches down for Will’s cock. Tracking his train of thought, Will slips his hand down around Hannibal’s and removes the condom, ties it off, and tosses it neatly into the wastebasket Hannibal moved closer to the couch while Will left to get the sheet. Hannibal uncaps the lube, drizzles a very generous amount onto the base of Will’s cock, and works it in with his hands.

The cool stuff warms up under Hannibal’s palm and in no time Will’s hips are bucking up into his hand and he’s kissing Hannibal hard on the mouth. A sharp, quick orgasm shocks through his system and he groans into Hannibal’s lips, melts when their tongues touch.

Hannibal secures his arm around Will’s waist and hums, satisfied. Will closes his eyes, gooey in more ways than just the one. He sighs, heart pounding and skin chilling where he’s covered in various drying, sticky fluids.

“The sheet was a good idea,” Will murmurs, blinking, though his eyelids are heavy.

“It seems we’ll need a shower before dinner.”

“Yes, please.”

Hannibal smiles against his shoulder and moves to kiss the spot just above his clavicle.

“In a moment.”

Will’s lips quirk, a different kind of warmth knotting up in his stomach. “Stay here for a while?”

Hannibal angles his head and looks at him, eyes shining and mouth smiling beautifully. He says, “Yes, it’s nice.”

Will leans down and kisses him, light, fleeting kisses, many of them, one after another. Hannibal laughs, and the warm buzz of it against his side is easily among the most gorgeous of feelings Will’s shared with another human being in a long, long time.

They don’t speak. They don’t need to speak. The sunlight filters in through the blinds, muffled, warming everything it touches. Everything is warm and soft; everything is perfect. They’re perfect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Prelude to a Kiss” (Ella Fitzgerald) by Duke Ellington and Irving Gordon.
> 
> The Lithuanian:  
> “Iki, brolite. Myliu tave.” = Bye, brother. I love you.  
> “Tave myliu, sesute. Viso gero.” = I love you, sister. Goodbye.  
> >People online said “Iki” is an appropriate, colloquial way to say goodbye, so there you go.  
> “Dievas.” = God.
> 
> The French:  
> “Vraiment?” = Really?  
> “Mais oui.” = Yeah, really. (Yahoo is also telling me that it can mean OH HELL YEAH).  
> “C’est beau.” = It’s beautiful.  
> “Très beau.” = Very beautiful.  
> http://www.mydictionary.net/french-english/Vraiment.html  
> >I scoured the internet, but I did use this website, specifically.
> 
> *Thanks, Drake. <3


	20. Let’s Spend the Night Together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys have things to talk about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Let’s spend the night together / I’ll satisfy your every need / And I now know you will satisfy me / Let’s spend the night together / Now I need you more than ever_
> 
>  
> 
>  **Please read:**  
>  Those scary tags about Childhood Sexual Abuse and Threats of Rape/Non-con are recalled events that don't take place in Will and Hannibal's relationship. There is no sexual abuse or rape taking place in the story. It is confirmed as never escalating beyond a very real threat and is not mentioned in detail.

After a long, distracting shower, a quiet, peaceful dinner, and about twenty minutes of heavy petting on the couch, Hannibal calmly reminds Will of their promise to have a meaningful conversation about the past. Will steals one more kiss to hold himself over and follows Hannibal when he leaves the study for the kitchen. He takes down clean wine glasses for the very tasty Rhône Hannibal lets him sample before pouring and carries both their glasses out back when Hannibal holds the door open for him.

The wine is almost purple in color and a very powerful flavor all on its own. Will takes one of the deck chairs and sits, swirling his glass and watching Hannibal play with the porch lights. He lowers them almost to the point that Will can’t see his face in the shadow, but his eyes adjust and he can see it all just fine. Hannibal looks like a ruddy burgundy flame in the darkness. Will fancies he himself looks like a pool of water in his deep blue shirt that stands out in the shadow just like Hannibal’s does.

Hannibal pulls his chair close to Will’s, and it’s a very intimate thing, neither close nor obvious but very special and private all the same. Will holds his glass in one hand and traces Hannibal’s wrist with the other. When Hannibal turns his hand to lace their fingers together, Will lifts his hand to his lips and presses a soft kiss to his skin.

“I wonder what our lives would have been if you had gone home with me that first night,” Hannibal muses softly when Will sets their hands back down on their armrests.

Will recalls Bedelia’s warning not to encourage his memory of the conference beyond what Hannibal could already piece together for himself, so Will just shrugs and offers a light chuckle. “We probably wouldn’t have lasted very long.”

“Did you think we would last after La Fin Absolue du Monde?”

It’s such a valid point about the French. Maybe Hannibal’s accent has a tendency to garble the vowels, but Will loves the sound of it. He leans over and steals a kiss off Hannibal’s cheek.

“I don’t know,” he confesses. “I told you I wanted more. I hoped we could have more.”

Hannibal brushes Will’s knuckles with his thumb. The night is warm. Far off, maybe the next block over, he can hear a car door slamming and noise of the social variety. He doesn’t have to wait long for the sounds to fade and cease altogether. Will asks, “What did you expect when you led me out of the club that night?”

“I thought we would fuck,” Hannibal says abruptly with a cheeky smile. Will laughs and sips his wine, flustered. Hannibal watches him through it, eyes dropping somewhere near Will’s throat. “I thought you would be gone in the morning.”

Will nods. “I thought you’d ask me to leave if I wasn’t.”

“You were genuinely surprised that I made breakfast?”

“Yes,” Will chuckles, crossing his ankles. He squeezes Hannibal’s hand. “It was pretty fantastic, the night we had.”

Hannibal studies him, tilting his head one way in preparation for the question Will can see brewing behind his dark, shining eyes. “Do you think we were looking for each other?”

Will breathes slowly around the smile trembling in his arms and his chest and his belly. He says, “I think we were always going to end up right here.”

Hannibal returns his smile, and Will can recognize the reciprocity as clearly as if Hannibal were reaching out and touching him with it. In a way, Will supposes he is. “On my back porch, Will?”

“With each other,” he corrects gently, bending to reach Hannibal’s shoulder with his lips. “ _Right here_.”

There’s a kiss landing in his hair before he straightens out again. Hannibal’s hard lines and sharp edges look fuzzy, even without the light to help Will see him. He thinks to take off his glasses, but then he’d be worse off than he is already, and he wants to be able to watch Hannibal through whatever it is they’re about to share, whatever it is that Hannibal tells him, and whatever it is that Will can give back to him.

It’s going to be beautiful _and_ jagged, and Will craves it, however lovely or horrific. He wants the closeness, even as it comes at the price of his own ugly history.

Hannibal hums. “What a life we’ve lived apart from one another.”

“All it took was the traumatic,” Will whispers, smile flickering. “Nothing brings people together like tragedy.”

“From the ashes, beautiful creations arise.”

Will looks at Hannibal, relaxing against the headrest and taking a long drink when Hannibal does. He’s grateful it’s too dark out for the perpetual blush to be seen in his face and neck. Hannibal has a tendency to be very distracted by Will’s bodily responses to him, and good wine tends to make Will warm and rosy in appearance. Various people throughout his life have told him that his constant flush gives him the look of being more open and inviting than he really is. Beverly teases him for it, relentlessly.

The dimly lit porch allows him to decipher Hannibal’s expressions and catalogue the emotion in his eyes without having to be too aware of his body, and vice versa. It’s a good balance. Will smiles at the planning of it, how it’s quite nearly architectural in its precision.

He waits for his smile to fade naturally before asking softly, “Do you really believe what you said about scars, that they come from God?”

“I hope that they do,” Hannibal whispers, leaning his head back and to the side to mirror Will. “The wonder of human biology and its restorative power is enough of a miracle to satisfy me.” He smiles, eyelids falling to half-mast. “We are, all of us, scarred.”

Will thinks about Abigail and says, “It means we survived.”

“Yes.” Hannibal nods, blinking his eyes open. “You, me, Abigail, my sister.”

Will stares at him and then down at the ripples in his wine that looks black in the moonlight. He offers, gently moving into incredibly dangerous territory. “Do you ever wonder what your life would have been like, without her?”

“Often,” Hannibal answers, voice strained. “And you?”

Will whispers, “Yes.”

“It’s a terribly black existence, isn’t it?”

“It would have been,” he confirms, voice trembling. “I don’t know h-how I would have…”

“No, neither do I.”

Will presses his lips together, blinks the moisture from his eyes, and gives Hannibal a wary glance. “What happened, to your arm, Hannibal?”

There’s a charged, frenetic moment of silence between them filled by the whir of insects in the trees. Will holds his wine through it and waits, in no hurry to hear or speak or leave. He’s ready to just wait for as long as he needs to, but Hannibal doesn’t make him do it for long. When he tugs for his hand back Will releases him immediately, gentle and patient through it all. Hannibal starts slow, finding his words and the story long buried beneath them at a safe, measured pace.

“Following our parents’ deaths, Mischa and I were placed in the care of a family friend that I…never liked nor trusted.” Hannibal swallows. “My father and Robertus had not spoken since before I was born, and it was months before someone knew to contact him, as I found out much later. He lived a lucrative life then, a difficult man to find and keep for long.”

Will is careful not to squeeze the glass too hard between his hands. He doesn’t speak while Hannibal assembles his thoughts and the speech to create them. The cicadas drone their songs in the darkness of the night closing in around them.

“Grutas was not a kind man,” Hannibal says, struggling around the name. He laughs, but Will can see light catching on the tears welled up in his eyes. “It’s been years now since I spoke his name.” He nods, face still turned toward Will’s, though his eyes look out distantly to the yard. “Many, many years.”

Hannibal knocks back a fast drink of the wine, taking no care to savor it. His breathing goes erratic, and Will watches, frozen, as he tips his head back and blinks around tears that escape and run quickly down his cheeks to his chin. His voice becomes thready and more heavily accented. “Mostly he ignored us, spent our family’s money, and threw parties for his friends. Mischa was…small then, just a child. She could walk and speak but could do little unassisted.

“We stayed in our room when it became unbearable, as it frequently was. Late in the winter, she fell ill.” Hannibal’s lip quivers, and he hides it with his hand before closing his eyes and composing himself. “She was coughing one night when he had company over, and we were discovered hiding in the closet wrapped up in a blanket. One of them looked at her in such a way that…that I’ve never been able to forget.

“Her lungs made a terrible wheezing sound when she breathed, but they refused to call a doctor.” Hannibal swallows, lowering his glass into his lap. “So after they had gone to bed I went by myself to the next house, which was—” Hannibal searches the sky as if retracing the memory and counting the miles he finds, “about forty minutes away for me on foot. We lived almost in the middle of nowhere.”

He tosses a weary smile in Will’s direction, but his eyes don’t travel beyond his knee. Hannibal bunches his shoulders up slowly, maybe not even aware that he’s doing it.

“I only wanted a doctor,” Hannibal says, fingering the bowl of the wine glass. “He didn’t keep a phone in the house. I had no choice but to go.”

Will drops his gaze from Hannibal’s face to his shoulder. He considers reaching for him, but he can’t tell if Hannibal would welcome the touch or if he needs to get the demons out of him first. Will waits, and Hannibal downs the last of his wine before leaning forward to set the glass down roughly on the wooden deck. The flinch waiting under Will’s skin holds through the sudden burst of sound. Hannibal straightens out in his seat and clears his throat, shoulders stiff and back ramrod straight.

“It was nearly three in the morning when I made it to Ignacy Bednarek’s farm. I had to pound on the door with my shoes to wake him.” A small smile flutters across his lips. “He was an impatient man for a farmer, but he knew my family and had attended the funeral, so he felt sorry for me and let me inside. When I told him how sick Mischa was, he agreed to send a doctor for her in the morning. Grutas never knew I left.”

A shiver builds in Will’s spine, anticipating the worst of it to come now. He holds his breath, and Hannibal continues.

“If he had known of it, perhaps he would not have smashed my arm in the door for trying to stop his friend when he took my sister into another room.” His voice darkens, rage and redemption possessing him simultaneously. “Ignacy Bednarek made good on his word. He arrived with the doctor at sunrise. They heard me scream a ways yet from the house and came barging in as strong and wild as the wrath of God Himself.

“There we were, brother and sister, each shrieking for the other’s safety. The Bednareks’ family physician saw to me while Ignacy went for Mischa. He beat her captor within an inch of his life, and it was the one thing that silenced my screams. They carried us to their truck, and Dr. Mandelŝtam drove the pair of us to a hospital.”

Hannibal pauses, takes a deep breath, and levels Will with a solemn expression that takes Will’s breath away. A muscle in his jaw twitches.

“Mischa doesn’t remember, thank God. She was much older when I could bear to tell her all that happened in that house once our parents were gone from it. The doctors who looked at her assured me that nothing…” Hannibal looks away. “…nothing obscene had been done to her that day or any day. They treated her pneumonia and set my arm.” He laughs wetly. “I remember she cried at the blood on my clothes. Mandelŝtam informed me that I was in shock. At the time it seemed to me that he was the one in shock, the way he could hardly focus on the road before him while I sat calmly for the duration of the drive.

“The trouble came when we arrived at the hospital and they tried to separate me from Mischa.” Hannibal flexes and relaxes his fingers, staring at his hand all the while. “I could not let go of her, not again.

“For a very long time, I was incapable of speaking with anyone. Mischa didn’t need me to speak, and she was the only one I ever needed to understand me. My sister knew my heart before I knew my mind. What they did to me painted a clear enough picture of the kind of men Grutas and Milko were, even disregarding the witnesses we had in Ignacy Bednarek and Dr. Mandelŝtam. I confounded the social worker assigned to my case, bit a different one.

“My arm was never a concern to me, even when it had to be broken again and reset. The rest of me took longer to recover. There was nothing I could do to break and reset the parts that hadn’t healed right. Mischa was my saving grace.”

Will asks, “And your aunt and uncle?”

“The headlines dominated the press. Our uncle got wind of everything we had endured. He and our aunt claimed us immediately. The pair of them had been in Japan that winter settling affairs with Oba’s family, and the shock of our father’s death paired with the scandal of what happened to us in the aftermath hit them all at once like a flashflood.”

Hannibal expels a soft sigh, eyes falling closed, and shoulders drooping down finally. Will blinks his own eyes open when Hannibal’s hand finds his and squeezes. He can’t squeeze back without removing his hand from Hannibal’s hold, so he leans over and rests his head on Hannibal’s shoulder instead. It doesn’t feel like a compromise, not when Hannibal turns and leans his head on Will’s in silent answer.

“Thank you for telling me,” Will mouths, breathless around the tightness in his chest. He wonders if Hannibal can feel his frame pounding in time with his full, heavy heart. “I know it hurts you still.”

“Yes,” Hannibal says curtly, speaking through tension that makes his accent sound much thicker. Will hears him take a stuttering breath. “No matter how long ago it happened, I find myself terrified of that moment when she was taken from me.” A blustery sigh washes over Will’s hair, and Hannibal turns to press his forehead down into his scalp. “…Terrified that something will change and she will be lost forever.”

Will sniffles once and straightens out, setting his glass down on his sturdy armrest as an afterthought. He separates their hands to pull Hannibal in for a tight hug that he almost can’t breathe around for their intensity. A steady stream of tears slides down Will’s cheek where his and Hannibal’s faces touch.

“You saved her, Hannibal,” Will breathes, running one hand up and down Hannibal’s back. With his other he scrunches Hannibal’s hair in his fingers. “You saved her. She’s safe, she’s alive, she’s happy.”

Will had observed long ago, early on in their relationship, that the sole fact of Mischa’s life was the impetus for the person Hannibal became upon his rebirth from the ashes of a fire that nearly destroyed both of them. He had internalized the weight of their love for each other, but he’d never quite thought of what the alternative could have been, who Hannibal might have been, if not for his sister. Without Abigail Will would be a shell of his old self. Without Mischa, what would Hannibal, the boy, have had left to keep him breathing?

“Robertus said music was the way out of silence for you,” he whispers.

“Yes, it was.” Hannibal moves to kiss Will’s temple, more a comfort taken for himself than one offered, though it serves both purposes. “Mischa, thankfully, never lived in silence. She was a beacon that way.”

“She lived in your silence,” Will murmurs, angling his head to press his forehead against Hannibal’s. “She kept you alive through it until something stronger came to defeat it.”

Hannibal touches Will’s cheek and slips his hand around the back of his head. “Just as Abigail kept you alive through your silence.”

A serene smile blossoms on Will’s lips. “We’re lucky to have such resilient women in our lives.”

Hannibal leans in for a proper embrace and breathes Will’s hair in, warm breath soothing and calming the storm in Will’s blood. They pull apart, and after a poised moment of mingled, erratic breath shared between them, Hannibal angles his head for a soft, testing kiss. Will holds on for as long as Hannibal wants the contact, holding Hannibal’s wet cheek under his hand. When Hannibal breaks the kiss, he faces forward in his seat with Will’s glass in his hand, and takes a long, slow drink. Will laughs at Hannibal’s casual, sidelong look but doesn’t move to stop him.

“I don’t know how to follow that story,” Will confesses in a small voice, accepting the half-drained wine glass when Hannibal gives it back to him.

Hannibal gives him a soft, head-tilting look and murmurs, “With your own, Will.”

Will gulps around a mouthful of air, chews on his lip, and pinches the stem on his glass. He mumbles, “It was our third rehearsal together. She didn’t have a ride, so I said we could have the lesson at her house.”

It was that simple, how all the madness started and escalated and imploded on itself. Will frowns and follows Hannibal’s example, swallowing down the last of his wine and handing the emptied glass off to Hannibal before attempting to go on. He sucks in a quick breath to extinguish the rush of alcohol filling his airway like smoke. The wine settles in his stomach, and he licks the taste of cherries off his lips. A heady flavor lingers in his mouth like the smell of burning incense.

“Her parents were okay with it, and by the end of the hour, Mrs. Hobbs had extended an invitation for dinner the following evening. I guess she thought it was going to be a regular thing, the at-home lessons, so she wanted to get to know me better.”

“And Garret Jacob Hobbs,” Hannibal prompts delicately. “Was he as generous as his wife was?”

“On the surface,” Will says, nodding his head jerkily. “I could tell he…didn’t want me there, not really, but Louise insisted, and Abigail looked so happy. Part of me was just curious what would happen, what he would do. I couldn’t…place what it was he thought my intentions were.”

“Toward his wife or his daughter?”

“Both,” Will says, scanning the yard blearily with unseeing eyes. “I should have just said no, but I had this feeling like I should be there. I had to be rude to one of them, Mr. or Mrs. Hobbs, so I made a decision and stuck with it.”

“When did you know?”

There’s a heavy implication in the simple question. _When did you know it had all gone to hell?_

“As I was walking up the driveway,” Will whispers. “I heard Louise yelling for help inside the house, and then something crashed and shattered, like glass.”

“So you went inside.”

“Not right away. My first instinct was that they were fighting.” He’s still whispering, and there’s nothing he can do to make himself speak up. “Garret Jacob Hobbs struck me as…volatile when I met him, like he was constantly balancing between a gorge and a lion’s den. I called the police, thinking domestic abuse, and then…I took my gun from the glove compartment.”

Will says, in a rush, “I have a license to carry. It’s not like…I didn’t expect to have to use it, but I know _how_ to use it if I _need_ to. I figured if he wouldn’t stop until the police got there, I could make him stop.”

He shakes his head, fingers clutching at his legs. Will looks at Hannibal, stricken with the memory. He says, “In all this time, it didn’t occur to me that Abigail might be in immediate danger. They were _expecting_ me, for Christ’s sake.” 

“Was she, in immediate danger?”

“It didn’t seem like it at first. They were in the kitchen, so I couldn’t see them, but they had to have seen me drive up.” Will’s hands sweat. He runs them through his hair, strands unsticking together at the disturbance. “I turned the corner, and all I saw was the blood on the wall and the pictures knocked onto the floor. Louise was still breathing when I got to her.”

“She was stabbed?”

“Her throat cut open.” Will licks his lips compulsively and takes a deep breath before continuing. “I went to try and stop the bleeding, and he came out of the kitchen with the knife held to Abigail’s neck. It was still wet with her mother’s blood. She was shaking and crying, trying to stay quiet.”

“What did you do?”

“I tried to save her mother.” Will closes his eyes, helpless even now at the thought. “He cut her too deep. She bled out faster than I knew how to stop it.”

Will waits for Hannibal to lead him and opens his eyes when he gets silence instead.

“She died in my arms while Abigail watched.” Will blinks and crosses his arms to subtly crush his shirt in his fingers. “I stood up, and we were both just…covered in the red. Abigail looked at me, eyes wide and terrified. She started screaming, and I didn’t know what to do.”

Hannibal says, softly, “You drew your weapon.”

“Yes,” Will sighs, detaching his death grip to rub at the scarred bit of flesh beneath his shirt. “I had him in my sights, but Abigail was between us. I hesitated; didn’t trust myself to make the shot. When he cut her anyway, I pulled the trigger again and again until he went down. I dropped the gun for a minute to press a towel to her neck and redial 9-1-1 for an ambulance.”

“He recovered the gun and shot you.”

“There was only one bullet left in the chamber.” Will clicks his tongue with a small shake of his head. “But he made it count.”

“I’m grateful he aimed only to wound your heart,” Hannibal says quietly, reaching for Will’s hand and slotting their fingers together.

“Me, too,” Will says, voice soft and muffled. He slides his thumb over the back of Hannibal’s hand, glad for a touch that grounds him. He sighs, turning so his cheek rests against the back of the chair. “When we got to the hospital, no one would tell me if Abigail was okay. I was in and out all day, people kept coming and going, doctors in and out, and…and I didn’t know.”

Hannibal changes out the hand holding Will’s for his opposite hand and reaches the freed arm around Will’s shoulders. “She was comatose for nearly a month.”

“Yeah.” Will leans into Hannibal’s side. “I haunted that hospital for weeks.”

“You were a patient yourself,” Hannibal reminds him, voice light, almost a tease.

“I was supposed to be resting,” Will grumbles. “First it was just doctors and nurses always on me to relax and let the medication work, but then the police officers started showing up, looking for blood. They knew Louise, wanted justice for her, didn’t believe I hadn’t had something to do with it all…Jack hired a lawyer from the Academy to keep them from arresting me, or shooting me when no one was looking.”

“And then the reporters came.”

“It didn’t faze me much at first, having them sneak in and stick camera phones and tape recorders in my face. I was living in a cloud anyway. What did I care if they wrote about what happened?”

“Did you?”

He shakes his head. “No, what they wrote about me didn’t sting.”

“What they wrote about Abigail: that bothered you.”

“Yes.”

Hannibal stays quiet for a few seconds, rubbing Will’s arm with a sturdy, warm hand and covertly taking Will’s pulse with the one around his wrist. He says, “When she awoke, I suspect the story changed.”

“People weren’t printing much of anything else.” Will drops his head against Hannibal’s. “Headlines, you know.”

Hannibal sighs. “Yes, I know.”

“No one would let me in to see her until she gave her statement to the police. When people were satisfied that our stories matched, I started hearing a lot of apologies, not that I wanted them.”

Will nudges his shoulder against Hannibal’s chest, maneuvering around the armrests to try and get comfortable. He anticipates that they’ll have to move before he can really settle in, but he doesn’t want to leave this position just yet. Part of him wants to go for a tumble in the grass and lie flat on the ground with nothing but the night sky and all its stars above him. Maybe Hannibal would go for it, once they took the wine glasses back inside.

“How did she come to live with you?”

“We saw a lot of each other in the hospital. Once I got a bit better and everyone knew I’d been telling the truth, the staff agreed to move me to a room that was closer to hers. She didn’t have any family left. It was just me and her friend Marissa who would visit her every few days. Once they discharged me I hung around, too.”

“She couldn’t stay with her friend?”

“Marissa was in between places, trying not to live at home but not quite at a fixed address yet. She was thinking about staying on-campus, and if that had happened Abigail definitely wouldn’t have been able to go with her. The family lawyers were there, all the time, talking real estate and bank accounts and trust funds and college admissions. It was a nightmare.”

Will reaches for the hand hanging over his shoulder, holding onto the wrist and biting his lip. “She didn’t want to go with me at first.”

“Perfectly understandable.”

“Yeah.” Will nods, pacified by Hannibal’s calm. “I only ever asked the one time, pleaded my case as objectively and humbly as I could, and accepted it without flinching when she told me what I could do with my offer.” Hannibal shrugs in tandem with the _well,-what-are-you-gonna-do?_ face that Will makes. “The next day I came to see her she had an overnight bag that Marissa brought for her. She just looked at me and said, _Let’s go then._ ”

An amused smile sits on Hannibal’s mouth when Will turns to look at him. He explains, “She reminds me of Mischa at that age.”

Will laughs. “More and more I can see why they get along so well.”

“All the pieces slotted together so nicely,” Hannibal agrees, smile lingering on his face. Will turns abruptly and kisses him where the curve lifts almost into a pout. Turning his head to break the kiss that leaves him breathless, Hannibal says, “Yes, a bit like that.”

“Lie in the grass with me,” Will murmurs into Hannibal’s cheek.

Hannibal laughs, still catching his breath, “Not if you’re going to kiss me like that.”

He swoops in and levels the playing field, curling the arm around Will’s back and getting one hand in his hair. A bit unconsciously, Will tries unsuccessfully to climb over the armrests separating them, which gets Hannibal to burst into a contained fit of laughter. Delirious and pleased, Will’s hands shoot for Hannibal’s ribs to tease out the kind of reckless, uncensored laugh that he really wants. He gets it but only for a moment before Hannibal slides out of his chair with lightning speed and ducks into the house with both glasses cradled in one hand.

Will spares the gorgeous black sky a parting glance and switches off the light when he steps through the backdoor into the kitchen. Hannibal’s at the sink washing their glasses and surreptitiously glancing at Will over his shoulder. He barks out a laugh and goes to stand behind Hannibal, winding his arms around his middle and tucking his chin over a firm, wonderful shoulder. Hannibal turns to kiss the corner of his mouth as he’s drying his hands.

“Really, Will, how can I take you anywhere when you can’t keep your hands to yourself?”

Will laughs and stands on his tiptoes to get his lips on Hannibal’s throat. There’s a flaw in his math and he pitches forward a bit too roughly, knocking Hannibal into the edge of the sink and half catching himself on the counter and on Hannibal’s hip. Hannibal meets his eyes over his shoulder, lips parted around a smirk to match Will’s surprised laugh. They watch each other, Will gentling Hannibal’s flank, and sliding his hand from the counter to Hannibal’s stomach.

Hannibal drops his head onto Will’s shoulder when he pulls him back, baring his throat for Will’s misaimed kiss. Will takes it, first just kissing and then mouthing slowly at his Adam’s apple. Even after he moves away he forgets to breathe. It takes Hannibal covering his hand to bring him back into himself and remind him of the need.

Will sucks in a quick breath and smiles, remembering Hannibal’s comment right before they got off track. He mumbles, “Where would you take me, Hannibal?”

“Anywhere and everywhere you would consent to go,” he answers after a moment of sleepily blinking at Will.

“Oh,” Will breathes, stepping back to give Hannibal room to turn and face him. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

“What is it?”

He grins and waits for Hannibal to relax when he sees it isn’t bad news. “Jack got me a job conducting for the Virginia Symphony this January.”

A gleam enters into Hannibal’s eyes and he absolutely beams. Gently, he says, “That’s wonderful, Will.”

“I think I’m going to do it.” Will nods, chuckling when Hannibal pokes him in his side.

He shakes his head and leans in to kiss Will on the cheek. “Only you, Will.”

Will touches noses with Hannibal and reminds him, the corner of his mouth lifting into a satisfied smirk, “Songbird, metronome, conductor.”

Hannibal laughs and hoists Will effortlessly onto the counter at his back. He runs his hands tamely up Will’s thighs and around his waist. Quietly, as if he’s just remembering the detail and he isn’t sure what Will’s reaction might be, he says, “The tour will be finished before January.”

Will winds his arms around Hannibal’s neck and hums, “Mm-hmm.”

The smile his simple admission earns him is gorgeous. Will doesn’t even know what to do with himself except hold on and wait for instructions. Hannibal feels Will’s back through his shirt, looking down to hide his smile when it goes nervous and self-conscious. Will leans in and waits until the line of Hannibal’s mouth relaxes beneath his lips. “Come to the concert,” he says, getting his hands on Hannibal’s shoulders. “Bring Mischa, the band, bring everyone.”

Hannibal’s eyes shine when he looks up at Will again, a ruddy flush in his cheeks and down the column of his throat. “My uncle will want to come.”

“Tell him he has to bring pralines.” 

“Maybe my aunt will come,” Hannibal says, dropping his gaze to Will’s chin as his mind goes to work. His eyes wrinkle at the corners. “She would adore Abigail.”

“Well, we’d love to meet her,” Will acquiesces, keeping his voice even and calm.

He almost falls off the counter when Hannibal buries his face in his neck to laugh. Looking pleasantly tipsy, Hannibal repeats into Will’s hair, “You’d love to meet her.”

Will holds on and hides his smile in Hannibal’s shoulder. “We would.”

He closes his eyes when Hannibal kisses him, lips soft and moving slowly against his. Hannibal’s fingers skate across his forehead, brushing his hair away. “Do you still want to lie in the grass?”

“Yes.”

Will smiles sleepily and slides off the counter when Hannibal gives him room to do so. He waits against the counter for Hannibal to leave the room and return with a neatly folded blanket. Will grins and leads the way outside, lingering in the door while Hannibal gets the lights in the kitchen. He leaves the porch dark and sprawls out on the blanket with Will once he lays it out for them on the ground. The stars look brighter now than they did before, probably because the lights have all been extinguished.

Hannibal lifts his arm when Will turns and wraps himself around his side. Will toes off his shoes and watches the deep purple-black sky above them, cheek laid flat against his boyfriend’s heartbeat. Fingers scratch idly at the nape of his neck.

“Thank you for giving me a chance,” Hannibal says, almost out of nowhere.

Will smiles and gives Hannibal a soft look. “Thank you for making me breakfast.”

He relaxes into Hannibal’s hold with a long contented sigh, and the sounds of nightfall swim and buzz around them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Clos Saint-Jean Deus Ex Machina Chateauneuf-du-Pape 2005  
> http://www.wine.com/v6/Clos-Saint-Jean-Deus-Ex-Machina-Chateauneuf-du-Pape-2005/wine/131666/Detail.aspx
> 
> From Harris’ _Red Dragon_ , page 83: “Have you seen blood in the moonlight, Will? It appears quite black. Of course, it keeps the distinctive sheen.”
> 
> Also from page 83: “Dr. Lecter seldom holds his head upright. He tilts it as he asks a question, as though he were screwing an auger of curiosity into your face.”
> 
> From Bryan Fuller’s _Hannibal_ (S2 E13: “Mizumono”): “All it took was the traumatic.”
> 
> From S1 E12: “Releves”: “I was curious what would happen.”


	21. Waiting on a Friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will’s life promises to become even more exciting with the possibility of new friends on the horizon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _But I need someone I can cry to / I need someone to protect / Making love and breaking hearts / It is a game for youth / But I’m not waiting on a lady / I’m just waiting on a friend_

Will wakes up early Sunday morning with the sunlight streaming in through Hannibal’s bedroom window and a heavy, warm body draped around his back that kicks up relentless butterflies in his gut. A delirious, sleep-fuzzed smile tickles at the corners of his lips, and he curves his shoulders and back forward into a gentle stretch that nudges Hannibal into wakefulness behind him. Will turns to look over his shoulder and whispers, “Good morning.”

He gets a hum in response. Hannibal pulls him in closer with the arm wrapped around Will’s side. The arm resting above Will’s head slides down under his other side, and he finds himself swathed.

“Your sister tell you when she’s coming by?” Will yawns, settling into the hold since he has no desire to leave it.

“Noon.”

“I thought she was coming over in the morning?”

Hannibal huffs a small sigh against the back of Will’s neck and noses at his ear. “Yesterday at the door, she informed me that she would be getting breakfast with Abel instead.”

“I think he likes her.”

“Oh, she’s been halfway in love with him since the divorce,” Hannibal says dismissively. “Donald wants to place bets, but no one will bet against him.”

Gently curious and fuzzy still from sleep, Will asks, “Abel was married?”

“For twelve years.”

Will hums, impressed and a bit mournful on Abel’s behalf. “Do you think Mischa will marry?”

Hannibal yawns into Will’s hair and squeezes his ribs gently in a brief embrace. “Hard to believe she hasn’t yet.”

“She’d make a beautiful bride.” Will sighs, relaxing into Hannibal’s arms and pressing back where he can feel anticipated morning wood right up against his ass. At the soft noise Hannibal makes, Will immediately decides not to talk about Mischa or the band again. “What do you want to do when you come home after France?”

Hannibal mumbles, hoarse but steadily coming into full alertness, “I want to have dinner with you at your home in Wolf Trap, Virginia, with your many dogs and your adopted daughter.”

Will smiles and doesn’t object. “Just the three of us?”

“Don’t you mean ten?” Hannibal chuckles when Will elbows him gently. “Yes, just the three of us. Mischa will not like the drive.”

“I meant to ask you before—” Will chokes on the rest of his words what with Hannibal’s hand slinking down to firmly cup and massage him through his shorts, which was inevitable, probably, with the way Will’s been moving against him so slowly but with enough pressure not to be ignored. Articulately as hell, he mumbles, “Um.”

Innocently enough Hannibal answers, “Hmm?”

“You’re…” Will sighs, head dropping back and mouth falling slack as he completely forgets his train of thought. He swallows thickly, his body far too engaged in the moment for him to even pretend at modesty. “Gonna run me ragged.”

“I hope so,” Hannibal teases. A quiet grunt breaks onto Will’s cheek in synch with Hannibal’s hips grinding against his ass. It’s fantastic. Will’s hand shoots back to hold onto Hannibal and bring him in closer the second time he rolls forward. They gasp together, and Hannibal drops his forehead into the curve of Will’s neck right as his hand is slipping under his clothes and pulling him out. “Do you remember our first night in this bed together?”

Will laughs, breathlessly aroused and already on the same exact page. “Yeah, when…” he grits out, paying more attention to giving Hannibal friction than chasing the grip of the fist closed around him. “…when we went a second time, an-and I took off my shirt.”

“We were lying just like this,” Hannibal murmurs breathlessly, the longer vowels nearly dragging into moans. He pants to catch his breath. “You wanted my skin on yours.”

“Wanted to know…” Will grunts, pushing up on his elbow to free the arm trapped under his body. He flops back down and Hannibal crawls on top of him, as naturally as breathing. He slips his knee in between Will’s legs and rocks against him, slow and hard. Will fumbles with Hannibal’s pajama bottoms and the silky boxers underneath. Hannibal undresses him in turn, and their hands are touching again in a more collective effort this time. “—what it was like.”

Hannibal’s too busy lavishing Will’s neck with open-mouthed kisses to reply after that, and Will frankly does not mind one bit. It’s relatively quick for both of them, but Will wasn’t expecting an all-out rumble. Hell, he wasn’t expecting to have an orgasm with his lazy morning in.

He’s genuinely out of practice with all this relationship stuff. Having a partially long-distance partner doesn’t help.

Once they’ve ruined the sheets—God, Hannibal must be out of spare bedding by this point—they lie around for a bit, lazily groping and teasing, kissing and chuckling. Will can get Hannibal to snort occasionally, and it’s pretty much the best thing he’s ever learned to do. Hannibal also discovers his fondness for twirling Will’s hair in his fingers and pulling gently at his curls so they bounce. They’re sort of ridiculous, the two of them.

Hannibal makes breakfast once they can stand to leave the bed about an hour later. Will has a hard time not touching him once they’re on their feet, which will be a very upsetting problem after Hannibal’s left again. It’s a bummer, but it doesn’t do anything to discourage Will from living it up while he can. He counts it as a very good thing, consequences be damned.

That resolve in mind, he makes it _incredibly_ difficult for Hannibal to make their waffles. He’s a downright pest about it and gets batter on his sleeve for his troubles. There’s also a hickey blossoming low near his collar bone that he thinks he should be able to hide easily enough—unless his shirt moves like it did when Beverly saw him the day after La Fin Absolue du Monde.

Hannibal’s cleaning up the kitchen when Will gets a phone call from Abigail that he answers immediately. “Abigail, hey.”

“Hi, Will.” Her voice cuts off half a beat too short like she’s changed her mind. “Are you still in Baltimore?”

“Yes,” he says with a noticeable lilt at the end. He glances at the clock. Mischa’s due to come over in about half an hour. “Do you need me to come home?”

“Oh, no, um, I was going to go with Marissa to see the kittens. I showed her pictures of them, and she’s thinking about adopting one of the tabbies.”

“Ah. Well, that’s great. Did you want to ride back home with me then, or were you going to drive?”

“Can I get a ride? That’s only if you’re still going to be there in an hour, and then we’ll still have to make a stop.”

“Yeah, that’s fine. Hang on.” He holds the phone away from his mouth and nudges Hannibal’s ankle with his toe. “Do you want to see some baby animals?”

Hannibal’s mouth twitches into a smile. “What?”

He brings the phone back to his mouth. “Have you called Elise and asked if it’s okay for you to go over?”

“Yeah, I called and got Margot. I guess it’s Elise’s turn in the nursery.”

Will nods. Elise is younger and generally gets along better with Abigail than Margot who is currently wholly interested in their baby and peripherally concerned—though not lazily so—about finding homes for the kittens. It’s more Elise’s territory than it is hers.

He says, “Okay, maybe we’ll see you there. I know Mischa wanted to see them at some point. If I’m not there when you’re ready to go home, just call me.”

“Got it. Bye.”

“Bye.” He slips the phone into his pocket and smiles slowly at the perplexed look on Hannibal’s face. “A friend of a friend has kittens.”

“Baby animals,” Hannibal repeats.

Will nods, eyes falling to the table when he feels Hannibal’s foot edging up his calf. “Yes.”

“Would your friend of a friend object to the company?”

“Since it’s in regards to the kittens, I don’t think so. She just had a baby a few months back, so getting them homes is probably priority enough for her to be open to it. I only met her a few weeks ago through Beverly’s friend, Saul.”

Hannibal nods, following along with the information as it’s presented to him. He’s heard of Beverly and to an extent, knows a bit about Saul. Will’s shown him pictures of everyone he works with so Hannibal at least can put names with the faces. He makes a note to definitely arrange something for his friends and Hannibal’s friends to come together and meet the next time they’re all in town.

Realizing that they won’t have a chance to do that until after the tour ends in December doesn’t even dishearten him. He’s sure they’ll work something out; he isn’t afraid anymore of the time stretching out ahead of them.

“Mischa expressed an interest in these kittens?”

“Oh, yeah, when she had us over for dinner for the first time. Her house, by the way, wow.”

Hannibal smirks and reaches out casually to brush his fingers along the back of Will’s neck. “Her first independently owned home was a cottage in Paris following her graduation from the ENSBA. We all went to visit her and discovered that we prefer large spaces when we gather.”

A small smile teases at Will’s mouth, and Hannibal makes a quiet noise like a scoff, adding, “Well, not Donald.”

Will laughs and kisses him, fingers bunched up loosely in Hannibal’s shirt and the smile staying on his lips for a long, long time. “He’s a beer-with-dinner kind of guy, isn’t he?”

“He will be so happy to hear that you guessed that about him,” Hannibal says with a mild headshake.

They clean up the kitchen and migrate to the library to pass the time before Mischa gets back—because putting his hands on Hannibal’s harpsichord is one of a few ways to keep him from putting his hands elsewhere—and play around for a while making lazy, distractible music. Will sweeps up and down his portion of the keys with relaxed ease and Hannibal matches his meandering with neat, well-timed chord shapes that add all the right curves and stops to the scales Will dabbles in.

“Is there anything you can’t play?” Hannibal asks conversationally, not sarcastically.

Will shrugs with one shoulder. “I’ve never gotten my hands on a singing saw.”

Hannibal straightens beside him. “What about a theremin?”

“Only once,” Will laughs, stunned at the shine in Hannibal’s eyes. “What? Oh, don’t…” He chuckles at the minute lift of Hannibal’s eyebrows. “You have one; that’s what you’re going to say, isn’t it.”

“Yes.”

And so Will finds himself upstairs in Hannibal’s bedroom with his hands hovering in the blank space that fills out the theremin’s domain. Hannibal bustles around behind him moving things around and making only enough noise to be detected in the room. Will stares at the antenna that will receive his left hand and switches the complex device on after acclimating to the feel of holding his hands in place. It plunges the atmosphere into a different level of tension and sensitivity.

He experimentally dabs his fingers near the horizontal antenna where the volume control is and holds his hand near the antenna to exhaust the instrument’s range, learning as he goes. Hannibal settles somewhere behind him. Will thinks he maybe sits on the bed, but he doesn’t turn to verify.

Cautiously like a child with his first steps, he positions his hands for a note and hums Clair de Lune under his breath as he remembers it. The imagined piano notes flutter through his mind, soundlessly whispered now on his lips, as he feels his way through, quite literally, for the song as Debussy wrote it. His hand lingers too long in one pitch and moves the wrong way, but he fixes it, making note exactly of how to move his hand and how not to move it when he wants this note, wants _this_ note, wants this other note, and so on.

The air once light and empty between his hands and the theremin fills with soft, ethereal sounds, lulled and provoked evenly into music. It’s airwaves and vibrations upon turning tides and sonorous tones tossed upon a shore he makes with every flick and retraction of his fingers. Harmony curls off of him like smoke or ribbons coming unraveled from around his knuckles, dangling music from his palm as neatly and spatially disjointed as a marionette.

Will’s hand falters at the percussive sound of a knock coming from the front door downstairs. He hasn’t even fallen back into himself enough to take his hands away when lips land clumsily on his temple and lovingly brush his hairline. “Play, please. I’ll come back.”

Briefly, as Hannibal’s stepping quietly out of the room past the samurai armor in the hallway to get the door, Will wonders how much of his speech patterns are a result of his being a polyglot. He thinks on some level Hannibal must know that Will thrills to hear him speak so bluntly and so closely to his heart all the time. Will loves hearing that he’ll come back, and he has questions about so much of it—about whether Hannibal even knows, about what he would do if he didn’t know but found out. Would he say it more often? Would he speak such things deliberately? Would he tease them out and turn them into flirtations, into seductions, into games…?

Blearily he moves his fingers again near the antennae of the theremin, wandering aimlessly through a Handel piece, though it melds with other compositions that Will knows. He begins on Lascia ch’io pianga, and by some unregistered feat of curiosity and fearless compulsion, finds himself in a wilting, altered Ouverture from _Agrippina_. 

“My God,” he hears Mischa say in a hushed voice as he drops his hands, tired and stiff through the shoulders from holding himself up so rigidly for the duration of his play. With a smile he can hear, she adds, “He’s better than you are, berniklitė.”

Will blows out a short quick sigh and drops his head forward, rolling his shoulders. He mumbles, “That was nice.”

He turns and sees Mischa grinning at him. “Nice is an understatement, you lovely oaf.”

“Thank you.” He shakes his hands out and catches his breath. Giving Hannibal a sneaky look and a matching smile, he says, “Takes you somewhere else, doesn’t it?”

“It does, yes.”

Mischa takes over the obligation for Will to speak and informs Will of Hannibal’s relationship with the theremin: “It was our Oba who introduced him to pretty instruments like this.” She nods her head at her brother, and when he only smiles peacefully at her silent prompt to speak for himself, she adds, grudgingly, “She did so love to teach him.”

“You aunt was the one who taught you to play?” Will asks.

“She taught me the harpsichord, the theremin, the flute, and the guitar.”

Will smiles at the list, knowing that it means their aunt can play them all and with competence. He had thought Robertus would have been the one to teach him guitar but recalls belatedly that the saxophone was his contribution to Hannibal’s impressive repertoire. “Music really runs in your family, doesn’t it?”

Mischa gives Hannibal an exaggeratedly put-upon look. “Not all of us, no.”

“Oba tried to teach you the harp when you were twelve,” Hannibal argues, and even Will can hear in the tone of his voice that it’s a weak point to make, especially if it’s his only one.

“Yes, and I broke two of her strings. Do you remember how angry she was?”

“She could never be angry with you,” Hannibal counters gently.

This _is_ a strong point, all the faith and conviction behind it that Hannibal possesses in his body. Will hears that, too, though it would be less obvious to someone who didn’t know how to listen to Hannibal or how to read Mischa’s body language. The calm, half-vacant expression on her face is lodged in a memory—a childhood that Will has been privileged enough to discover was not all good or beautiful or happy.

Gently, Hannibal says, “Will is on his way to see those kittens you’re after.”

“I am not after them,” Mischa protests, fondly rolling her eyes. Smiling, she reminds him, “I have an enormous house. If I choose to fill it with domesticated animals, there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Will scratches his cheek, hiding his smile behind his hand. Hannibal sees it and playfully kicks his foot.

“Let’s go then,” Mischa says brightly, throwing a wink at her brother. “Maybe we’ll even find one for you.”

Firmly he says, “No.”

Will laughs at them and heads downstairs for his keys and other assorted odds and ends that he can’t leave the house without. Before exiting the house he calls Margot for himself and gets Elise, who’s probably with Abigail and Marissa, judging by the other voices he hears in the background. She’s enthusiastic about extending the invitation to Mischa and Hannibal, actually excited to have more people interested in their kittens. He asks briefly about the baby, a little boy named Barney, and Elise tells him Margot took him for a drive around the block because he started fussing when he heard people at the door.

He feels guilty about the intrusion and asks if it’d be better not to go, but Elise ignores his offer. She sounds tired, probably from watching Barney, but he can’t hear reluctance in her tone when she reassures him that they’ll be fine coming over. Will gives Hannibal and Mischa the green light and hangs up. He makes for his own car, letting Hannibal know on the way out that he needs to accommodate for Abigail. Mischa slips into Hannibal’s impeccable, glorious Chevelle, and they drive separately to the Nichols-Verger house with Will leading the way.

It’s two stories, neatly landscaped, and framed by alternating brick, gray paneling, and pristine, white columns and shutters. Will knocks on the sturdy earth-brown door, and Marissa is the one who receives them, which, he sees, is because Abigail and Elise currently have their hands quite full.

There’s a dark orange kitten clinging to Abigail’s shoulder and a clumsy black kitten floundering in her lap like an overturned turtle. Elise has two holding onto her sleeved arms, an orange-speckled tortie and paler blonde that must be the one Marissa wants. Another primarily black tortoiseshell is clinging onto Marissa’s shirt with tiny white claws dragging on the fabric—all fives kittens accounted for and their mother curled up against Elise’s leg, perfectly uninterested in the goings-on around her. Behind him Mischa makes a noise like a squeak, and Hannibal laughs.

Will walks in and introduces Hannibal and Mischa to Marissa—who stares a bit too long at Hannibal—and then to Elise who extends a hand but doesn’t try to get up from her spot on the floor. Will doesn’t blame her. Her blonde hair is in a messy bun, but there’s a red stain of color on her lips that doesn’t catch in the light and a natural flush in her cheeks that makes her look very young. It reminds Will of his own tendency for going slightly red in the face, how she looks innocent and kind but only partially because of what he knows about her personality and temperament.

“Here,” she says to Mischa, once she’s decided which one of the siblings will be easier to persuade into taking a kitten home once they’re old enough. Will knows because Abigail’s been keeping track that they’ll be eight weeks old on the day Hannibal comes back from Lyon. 

Mischa about swoons once the tortie kitten is in her hands. She coos at her—Will assumes the kitten is female because torties and calicos typically are—and asks, “When were they born?”

“The seventh of August,” Elise answers without missing a beat.

Mischa whips around to look at Hannibal, a mischievous look on her face. She laughs, “They were born on your birthday.”

Will looks at Hannibal, too. “Wait. Your birthday?”

Hannibal opens his mouth but stops short of speaking, looking down to acknowledge the mother of the litter brushing up against his leg.

“You left for Munich on the eighth,” Will says, stepping out of the way when Marissa comes to trade her tortie kitten for the deep orange tabby in Abigail’s arms. 

“Charlie,” Elise calls fruitlessly after the recently skinny mother when she daintily follows Hannibal’s retreat.

“Will she let me hold her?” Hannibal surprises Will, and Abigail and Elise, by asking.

He crouches when Elise nods and gingerly feels around Charlie’s belly for a handhold. He settles for cradling her ribs in one hand and the spot just beneath the soft slope of her shrunken stomach. Her small feline form makes his hands look huge and infinitely gentle. Mischa has become completely absorbed in the black cat struggling still to escape the cage of Abigail’s legs, so she doesn’t alert to Hannibal’s interaction with the cat. Marissa sits beside her and relieves her of the tortie kitten so Mischa can extract the black kitten from Abigail’s lap.

Hannibal lifts Charlie at level with his chest and slots her side into place against his sternum. She doesn’t protest but rather looks completely relaxed and even pleased in his arms. Will looks at him, and Hannibal raises one expressive eyebrow as if daring him to say something.

Will sighs and holds his hands out to Elise. She promptly places a black squirming kitten with vivid orange splashed across the left side of her face and highlighting the teal green of her eyes. They negotiate limbs for a moment before the kitten gets comfortable enough to stop kicking at him. Hannibal is smiling at him once he manages not to drop the tiny, fragile life in his hands.

“You’re entirely a dog person, aren’t you?”

“Like you’re a cat person, you mean?” Will smirks at the content feline purring in Hannibal’s arms. She’s deep orange like the kitten currently in Marissa’s arms. When Hannibal doesn’t respond right away, Will asks Elise, “Is that the one you’re keeping?”

She looks at Charlie’s doppelgänger and nods yes. “He’s a mama’s boy. They’re inseparable.”

Hannibal supports Charlie with his hand extending from the top of her belly to just beneath one of her forelegs and jostles her very little in the process. His freed hand moves to scratch at her ear. Will nudges just the tip of one finger over the space between his kitten’s eyebrow whiskers. She purrs happily, a funny, light trilling noise that actually makes him laugh.

“Why didn’t you tell me about your birthday?” Will asks quietly, walking away from the group toward the hallway.

“I thought you would feel obligated to behave a certain way if you knew.”

Will chuckles. “What?”

An embarrassed look comes over Hannibal’s face, and he hides it by looking down and closing his eyes when Charlie bats at his nose. Will’s glad in that instant that she won’t be separated from at least one of her babies. She’s tactile and affectionate, and with Margot and Elise busy with baby Barney, it’s nice to know she’ll have one of her own litter to keep her company. There’s something poetic and quaint about Margot and Elise claiming the stray for their own, the three of them all linked in motherhood.

“I didn’t want you to stay because it was my birthday,” Hannibal says after straightening out and offering Charlie his finger for her to swat at instead of his nose. “We were already pressured into our actions by the time constraints of the tour. If you were to stay that second night, I wanted it to be because _you_ wanted to.”

“You’re unbelievable sometimes, you know that, right?” Will gives him a soft smile when the look on Hannibal’s face doesn’t brighten immediately. “Wait, is that why your uncle brought pralines?”

Now Hannibal does smile, as if it’s amusing to him that Will remembers details like that. “Yes, that was why.”

The tortie kitten yelps and scrambles out of his hold to climb up to his shoulder. Will winces at the flimsily developed claws scraping at his skin. “I thought they were just welcoming you home.”

“Ah, actually,” Hannibal moves his hands and lowers Charlie back onto the ground. He accepts the restless tortie kitten Will holds out to him. “We came home because Martin’s had us on tour every year for my birthday for the last three years. Bringing us home this year was his way of apologizing, I suppose.”

“That’s Martin De Laurentiis, right? Your manager?”

Hannibal smirks, first at Will and then at the pliant kitten nestled in the crook of his elbow. The front door opens, and Elise works her way out from under the kittens in her hold to meet her partner in the hallway. Hannibal steps instinctively into the living room to allow her to pass. Will stands beside him and smiles when Margot pokes her head in as she’s handing the car seat off to Elise. Quietly with eyebrows raised, she says, “Hello.”

In an equally hushed voice, Will greets her, “Hi, Margot.”

“Will.” She reaches for his hand, grip firm and eyes steady.

“This is my boyfriend, Hannibal.”

Hannibal smiles when he’s named and takes her hand once it’s extended to him. “The incomparable saxophonist for Nemean Lion,” Margot announces softly, voice lined with gentle, unassuming praise. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“You as well.” Hannibal tips his head. “You have a lovely home.”

She nods once, modest. “Thank you.” Her eyes dart down, noticing the cat hair on Hannibal’s shirt that only Charlie could have left on him. “Oh,” she chuckles, for a second forgetting to control the volume of her voice. “She’s sociable, isn’t she?”

“Yes, she is,” Hannibal agrees, smiling. “She is a good mother to them, I suspect.”

Margot hums in confirmation, dropping her eyes to Hannibal’s kitten and raising one finger to her tiny black nose. She doesn’t flinch away from it, but her whiskers twitch and eventually she moves away.

“How many boys and girls, did you say?” Will asks.

“Two girls and three boys.” Margot looks around, doing a quick head count before honing in on the sleepy tortie in Hannibal’s arms. “The blonde and the one you’re holding are female.”

“The other tortie is a male?” The orange tabby and the black kitten are the other males in the litter.

“Yes,” Margot sighs. “I want to keep him, but Elise has her heart set on the orange tabby. She’s already taken to calling him Monty.”

“Why not keep them both?” Hannibal asks, brushing his thumb over the sweet spot on the black-and-orange kitten’s head that Will found before. She purrs with the same predictability that would just melt Will’s heart even if he didn’t like cats—not that he’s crazy about them, but these are tiny baby animals; he couldn’t _not_ like them. “You have enough space to allow for three small animals.”

“She wouldn’t object to that, but we want them all to go to good homes.” She shrugs. “If someone wants to take him, we’ll still have room here for the ones we _can’t_ rehome.”

Will inventories the kittens he can see. Marissa will take one of the five, Mischa will probably take at least one, and Margot and Elise have their eyes on two of the litter. There’s only one to be accounted for in the event that Mischa takes only one, and it occurs to him that while he has no reason to suspect she would want more than one, he can’t see her bringing home _only_ one. Maybe it’s because she has two dogs, though for years Tianlu had been her one and only.

As if she’s having a similar thought, Mischa asks from her spot on the floor, “How many others have looked at them for adoption?” A second later she remembers herself and carefully stands up, surrendering the black kitten to Marissa to make the action easier. “I’m sorry, I’m Mischa. I’m Hannibal’s sister.”

Margot shakes her hand and gives her a small smile. “A few of Saul’s friends and some of Elise’s family. Her parents are thinking about taking her,” she says in regards to the kitten nuzzled under Hannibal’s chin and falling asleep. “Marissa, you haven’t changed your mind about your blue-eyed blonde?”

Marissa smiles and shakes her head, gives an emphatic, “No.”

Elise floats back into the room, looking slender and graceful in her flowing white dress. It’s a big contrast from Margot’s loose shirt of sheer black and gray material. They make a beautiful pair the two of them, similar in a few small ways and varied in all the ways that reveal aspects of their very different character traits and dispositions. Elise’s features are soft and vibrant where Margot’s are more elegantly severe and monitored at every edge and curve alike.

“I think I might be in love with this funny little boy,” Mischa muses next to Marissa, totally coddling the black kitten curled up against her chest. Will can see her having a black cat. He wonders how Bixie and Tianlu would handle a new animal in the house, but he’s seen firsthand how gentle and slack they are with each other.

“Oh, you can have him,” Elise coos. “No, really, please take him.”

Mischa beams. “I have dogs. Would a trial run be out of the question once they’re old enough?”

Sounding relieved enough for the both of them, Margot says, “That would be perfectly fine.”

The pleased grin on Mischa’s face fades into a softer smile. “If things don’t work out with your remaining tortie, I’ll take her off your hands, too, and you can keep the male for yourself?”

Margot gets a look on her face that Will can’t interpret before it flickers away into a more recognizable smile. Will thinks maybe she’s shocked at what Mischa’s offering. Elise nudges her side with her elbow and muses, voice sweet and confidential, “Aw, babe, did you tell them about wanting to keep Python?”

Abigail looks up from the blonde kitten rolling around in her lap. “You’re going to call him Python?”

The red tint that creeps up Margot’s neck and disperses up the line of her jaw makes Will duck his head to hide his smile. Margot turns on Elise, flustered. “What else am I supposed to call him if you insist on calling his brother Monty?”

Elise just laughs, a lovely rose pink in her cheeks that, paired with her dark blonde hair and bright blue eyes makes her look just stunning. She’s a perfect match for Margot—brings the right kind of buoyancy to her that creates a remarkable balance that’s brilliant to watch. Will wants to do dinner with them sometime but isn’t sure how to ask, especially since Barney is still so young and Margot is still recovering from childbirth.

He’d mentioned it to Beverly at one point hoping she’d have advice to give him, and she’d been all for it, far too enthusiastic about him making friends to care about the details. The introduction of Nemean Lion into his social circle—that’s how she’s been thinking of it, against his wishes—has just been catnip for her. That’s not even to mention how she feels about Mischa or their kindred love for dogs.

Saul gave him the same kind of talk; he basically stressed that they’re mostly solitary people but that Elise likes the opportunity to go out every now and then whenever the opportunity presents itself and that Margot’s interests consist of her family with Elise and horseback riding on her father’s estate.

“You would do that?” Margot asks, kneeling to run her hands down Charlie’s back and then lift her exactly the way Hannibal had. Charlie purrs and bumps Margot’s chin with her head. “I wouldn’t want you to feel pressured into it. Taking on a new animal is a big step.”

“Will told me weeks ago about your new litter. I’ve been asking everyone I bump into since then if they would be interested, and they all seem to have a preference for adopting out of animal shelters.”

Margot nods. “That’s the main problem we’ve run into.”

“Was she pregnant when you took her in?”

Elise tilts her head to one side with a silent question that Margot voices, “How did you know?”

Easily as if she isn’t complimenting them, Mischa replies, “Responsible pet owners spay and neuter.”

Hannibal steps around Will’s back to take the tortie to the cats’ makeshift bed of a retired cardboard box, a quilted blanket and well-used cat toys. He watches each of his steps, looking vaguely like an interpretive dancer, both arms clutched to his chest supporting the dozing kitten there. Will follows him with his eyes and bends to retrieve the black kitten Mischa expressed interest in earlier. He’s easier to hold than his sister was and not because he’s tired but because he’s quicker to trust strange hands.

He hears Mischa say, “Of course, the only thing keeping them _out_ of the shelter is that they’re presently in your care,” understanding the situation perfectly and earning an emphatic nod from Margot in response.

“Exactly.” She sighs. “Our social network just isn’t what it would have been if I hadn’t dragged Elise out here.”

“It’s not like you were putting me out,” Elise murmurs, snatching Monty up from his dutiful spot by her feet. She looks at Mischa. “My parents came out to Essex last year, so it’s really not a big deal at all.”

“Where are you from originally?”

Hannibal comes back to Will’s side and casually weaves his arm around Will’s back. He leans on him, and the black kitten looks up at him with very blue eyes. “I wonder what color they will be once the blue has gone.”

“Hmm, green,” Will says thoughtfully.

“I think yellow.”

Will cracks a smile, nudging one finger under the kitten’s tiny chin. “A good old-fashioned Black Cat.”

“He will require a broom, naturally, for the image to be complete.”

“Well, naturally,” Will agrees with an exaggerated nod. Hannibal smiles and ruffles the scruff of the kitten’s neck. “Any idea what she’ll want to name him? Or the sister?”

Hannibal shrugs with one shoulder, watching his sister converse with Elise and Margot like socialization is the easiest thing in all the world. Will doesn’t doubt it is, for her. Hannibal murmurs, looking at him again, “Not a clue in all the world.”

“You’re sure you don’t want one of them for yourself?”

“Oh, yes.” Hannibal shakes his head ruefully. “Can you imagine?”

Will’s _been_ imagining it since Hannibal asked if he could hold Charlie, so yes, he absolutely can imagine. There’d be a little bit of cat hair here and there, an impressive amount on his clothes probably, and he’d need a litter box in one of the rooms—Will doesn’t know _which_ room would work best for that purpose. Hannibal’s thought of it before, Will’s certain of it. He lives in that big house of his with only himself and his music to keep him occupied. Will’s always loved keeping dogs, and cohabitation with Abigail had been such a welcome, if startling, injection of variety into his life.

“I could be a temporary cat person,” Will says, shrugging and grinning when Hannibal laughs at him. He protests, unable to stop smiling, “No, really. She fell asleep on you. It was adorable.”

“You are ridiculous, Will Graham.” Hannibal takes the black kitten out of Will’s hands and bounces him a little before depositing him delicately over his collar bone, right above his heart. “I am endlessly amazed at you.”

Will just shrugs again, a small smirk living permanently on his lips. The more he thinks about it, the more he convinces himself he’d love for Hannibal to have a kitten. The tortie who would be his companion on the off-chance that Hannibal decides he does want to take her home has almost a marble sheen through the orange mask painting the left half her face. It matches the smattering of color on her front paw on the same side, and Will thinks she’s charming like Hannibal is charming.

“Will has a habit of picking up strays as well,” Mischa says, speaking loudly enough that Will blinks and looks up at them and the casual way he’s been invited into the conversation. “He’d understand better than I would how frustrating it can be rehoming an animal.”

“I’ve only done it a few times,” he says, feeling only a little embarrassed to have their eyes all trained on him. Abigail’s looking at him, too—she’s heard him say that he’d like to make friends of the Nichols-Vergers. “The bulk of them I’ve kept.”

Although Elise gives him a knowing, sympathetic smile, they don’t laugh at him like he half expects them to. It’s a nice change of dynamic from what he’s accustomed to expecting from people who don’t know him well.

Elise asks him a polite question about where he is on the map, and Will gives her a breakdown of the highway near his farm and the land he owns, which leads Margot to tell him about her father’s horse ranch. Will looks over after a few moments of this easy, light exchange to find Hannibal crouched by the cat bed to tuck the black kitten in next to his sister. He fumbles to rest his head on the back of her neck right away without a second thought and falls asleep. After all the action he’s seen in the past hour, he’s thoroughly worn out and ready for a long rest. Marissa puts her blonde girl to bed in the next second, leaving Monty and Python, aptly, to roam.

When Margot sets Charlie down, she makes a beeline for Monty and carries him off to bed. Python, in the meantime, charges Will’s leg and climbs like the Dickens until he reaches his belt. When he sort of stops there and doesn’t move to get down Will enlists Hannibal’s assistance in getting him down.

“I know you’re only in town for a while longer what with the tour,” Elise says to Hannibal once she’s calmed down from her laughing fit, “but we should have dinner. Will?”

Will’s very warm face warms a bit more with an elated kind of spark he feels right in his throat like joy wanting to strangle the breath right out of him. “Yeah, that’d be great.”

He doesn’t miss Abigail grinning at him from where she’s standing next to Marissa after coaxing Python to bed at last. Like clockwork, Barney starts crying on the baby monitor on the shelf near the window in the living room. Elise slips out of the room to go and see to him, and it’s the perfect time, with the kittens going to bed and the baby waking up, for them to make a casual exit. Mischa hangs back to brag on Hannibal’s behalf about his prowess in the kitchen for whenever they do end up having dinner, and Will does his part to nod and smile when she cues him in.

Margot sees them out and catches Charlie when she ventures too close to the door. Will concludes, based on the calm, happy smile on her face, that their presence was a much-needed intervention from the sometimes-lull, sometimes-rush of isolated parenthood. He doesn’t know their experience exactly, but he remembers what it was like when Hannibal came into his life and interrupted the status quo—his existence that had been all about PT, his dogs, and making Abigail happy.

Mischa skips off to the car, and Abigail goes with Marissa to see her off. Hannibal pulls Will into a kiss that’s quick at the first touch and then slower as it steadily deepens. Will’s right about to see how much tongue he can slip him when Hannibal breaks the kiss—and just in time because he can see Marissa gawking at them from the corner of his eye.

Hannibal bumps his forehead into Will’s. “Will I see you tonight?”

Will nods, hand shaped around the curve where Hannibal’s shoulder meets his neck. “Yes.”

“Okay.” Hannibal smiles and squeezes his arms once before breezing back to his car, leaving Will warm and cold at the same time in a delicious, slow-burning ache kind of way.

Mischa’s got her door open and her chin in her hand, positively _beaming_ at him. He laughs and tells her, “There are actually _hearts_ in your eyes.”

“It’s my default look for idiots in love,” she answers expertly as Hannibal starts the car.

Abigail waves as Marissa drives off, and Will counters, smirking, “We’re gifted musicians-and-intellectuals in love.”

“My kind of idiots,” she answers pleasantly, pulling the door shut and grinning at him the whole time Hannibal inches down the driveway into the street.

Will smiles and waves as they go, getting into his own car finally and sighing once he’s behind the wheel. Abigail already has her seatbelt on and a wide, open smile on her face. “You just told her that you dorks are in love.”

He shrugs, a smile on his face to match hers. “Well?”

Abigail covers her face with her hands and laughs once, loudly, stomping her feet a bit. “It’s about time.”

“We haven’t even been dating that long,” he objects semi-bashfully, turning on the radio and pulling out onto the street to take them home.

“Well, it feels like forever to the rest of us.”

He agrees with her on that point and leaves their mutual satisfaction to the music, some contemporary jazz station neither of them changes. While they drive, he thinks about Charlie and her kittens, the cat hair on Hannibal’s shirt, Barney’s garbled cries on the baby monitor, and Mischa’s adoring look at him. He feels incredibly, comfortably paternal and has a brief, fleeting thought about what Hannibal would be like with children. It isn’t a mystery to him why he’d be thinking about fatherhood just now, but he makes himself stop it. Pets and long distances are enough of a hurdle to jump, for now.

_And besides,_ Will thinks, sneaking a covert glance at Abigail when they come to a red light just before the on-ramp to the freeway, _I’m still needed here._

He’s needed. People need him. It’s an exquisite circumstance of the life he’s come to accept as his own. Will drives, and the song changes. He sees Abigail smiling again and smiles with her, not even knowing why and not requiring an explanation in any case. He’s happy. He’s in love, and he’s happy.

And Hannibal is a cat person. Who knew?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Torianna Lee as Elise Nichols in this AU  
> http://www.imdb.com/name/nm4941374/
> 
> TED Talks’ guide to the theremin  
> http://www.ted.com/talks/pamelia_kurstin_plays_the_theremin
> 
> Nichols-Verger House  
> http://www.floorplans.com/plan-detail/AFLFPW22729/country-charmer-with-open-layout
> 
> Margot’s pretty outfit  
> http://www.nerdsraging.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/margot.jpg
> 
> Female tortie  
> http://www.pinterest.com/pin/359936195189603750/
> 
> Mischa’s (black) and Marissa’s (blonde) kittens  
> http://www.pinterest.com/pin/494833077778863741/ 
> 
> Monty  
> http://www.pinterest.com/pin/14144186302518489/
> 
> Python (THE REAL KITTY WAS NAMED AFTER EDDIE IZZARD, HELP)  
> http://www.pawnation.com/2009/09/01/tortoiseshell-cat-shocks-britain-with-family-jewels/


	22. I’m Not Signifying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The tour resumes.
> 
>  
> 
> *The whole section with German in this chapter is translated into English in the End Notes. Also, there is mention of child abuse in this chapter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Honey, I’ve been lying / Honey, I’ve been jiving / Honey, I’ve been signifying / Whoa, whoa, whoa / When you’re lying on the ceiling, baby / And I’m gazing on your floor / Have you ever had the feeling, baby / That you’ve been here before?_

They visit Donald’s youngest brother, Ian, at Kiste in Stuttgart and take a day after the show to see Ian’s wife and their young son. Hannibal calls Mischa from the Sutcliffe’s bedroom on the second floor after dinner to check in, and she teases him about Margot and Elise’s kittens. Following an incongruously serious conversation about the possibility of him adopting the female tortie—which he finds himself _considering_ given the case she makes in favor of it—she asks him how he’s holding up on his side of the world.

“I do love Germany,” he says sarcastically.

“Oh, hush, you always have a good time there, especially when you get to see Kenny.”

“I’m tired of being away from home.”

She hums. “Away from home, or away from your lovely love?”

“Don’t mock me,” he grumbles sourly. “I told them I didn’t want to do an extended tour.”

“The Lion’s doing superbly, brother,” she murmurs soothingly. “You’ve had a long run. That kind of success doesn’t just stop.”

“It does all the time. How many were there like us who grew into their music at our side and fell away from the limelight never to be heard of again?”

“No one would blame you if you didn’t want to do it anymore, brother,” she says sincerely.

Hannibal pauses in his ungrateful rant. Some days he would like to leave the band altogether, but it’s never been an honest option in his mind. Yes, he tires of the noise and the movement and the unrelenting pace, but he loves it, too. There’s a part of him that he thinks always will, but it wouldn’t be so bad to give it a rest just for a while. A reprieve, however long or brief, would allow him to invest in something outside of the music—Will, maybe, if that’s something that’s still welcomed when push comes to shove.

“Tave ten, brolite?”

“Taip, sesute, I’m here.”

“There doesn’t need to be another tour after this one, if you don’t want there to be. Bryn has asked already to come to Vilnia in January. You know she’s always had a love of visual art. Why don’t you see how the others feel about a break?”

They stay on the phone until she needs to leave to return to the tattoo parlor. Later in the afternoon she has a dog-walking date with Will and Abigail. By all accounts he conceals his jealousy fairly well.

Downstairs everyone is either lounging with half-drained drinks or standing around with them. Hannibal catches Ian’s son in the kitchen playing with the overlarge moose and lion plush toys Donald and Abel brought back for him from the States. Kenny stands quickly when Hannibal stops in the doorway between the living room and the foyer to watch him. He’s tall for his age and fair-haired and light-complected like his father, and like Mischa when she was his age.

“Hallo, Kenny,” Hannibal says when the bright-eyed toddler boldly advances upon him.

“Moin,” he says after a moment’s assessment. He has the moose by its antlers and the lion by the throat; the look on his face is open and trusting. It’s nothing short of comical.

“Wie geht’s dir?”

Kenny shrugs, calmly unsmiling but pleasant in demeanor. He says, “Gut.”

“Your uncle and Abel gave those to you,” Hannibal observes in the name of conversation—speaking English before he can catch himself and not bothering to translate since Kenny is in the process of learning both. He has a creeping suspicion that if Will were here, he would make it his mission to befriend him.

Will with his dark curls and modest attire; Will with his tendency for picking up strays; Will with his adopted daughter in everything but name; Will with his love for dogs and his easy alliance with Mischa…

Will.

“Uncle and Grandma,” Kenny corrects him, eyes sparking with recognition and something endearingly close to pure happiness. Hannibal’s seen it in him from their earliest encounter just three weeks following the boy’s birth. He has always been a happy child. “Oma Abba.”

Hannibal bites his lip to repress an unrefined snort, and someone places a hand on his shoulder. He turns and finds none other than Oma Abba wearing an expression of total affection—and resignation—on his usually stoic face. Abel squeezes Hannibal’s shoulder and turns fond eyes on Kenny, now meticulously twisting the lion’s mane into skinny spikes with childishly pudgy fingers.

“Ärgert dich der Onkel, Späetzchen?”

“Nein.” He shakes his head and drops the moose and Abel swoops down to get it for him. Kenny secures it under one arm so he can continue to style the long threads in his small, chubby fingers. “Der Onkel ist lieb.”

Abel smiles. “He’d better be.”

“Kenny,” his mother calls when she spots him from her perch by the fireplace. Hannibal watches her hand a nearly full glass off to Ian and steps aside when she approaches. Her eyes are bright and her mouth relaxed and smiling as she looks from them to her son. “Ist es Zeit zum Schlafengehen?”

“Nein,” Kenny says slowly, his answer half a question. He looks very, adorably guilty.

He didn’t inherit her dark hair, but his sharp hazel eyes are Sophie’s entirely. She smiles and crouches to be at level with him. She taps the moose under his arm and he hands it off with a wide, sweeping gesture common enough to young children.

“Ist dein elch müde?” she asks—the picture of knowing patience.

Abel gives Hannibal a completely besotted look at the contemplative look on Kenny’s face. After a lengthy pause he finally says, with the confidential air of divulging a dangerous secret, “Ja.”

Sophie runs her free hand through his hair. She tells him, “Na dann, auf geht’s. Ab ins Bett mir dir, schätzchen.”

“Okay, Mama.”

“Say good night to Papa’s friends, huh?” She extracts the lion with its sadly misshapen halo of hair and waits for Kenny to hug both Abel and Hannibal before walking with him up the stairs to his room.

“Gute Nacht, Sophie,” Abel says for them both.

“Gute Nacht,” she replies over her shoulder before disappearing around a corner upstairs.

“Aw, you got him sent to his room,” Donald complains from the doorway of the living room. “Party’s just getting started.”

“If by that you mean that we’ll be leaving soon, then yes, it’s really taking off, Donald,” Abel coos.

Bryn squeezes past them to get into the kitchen with the emptied glasses. Donald follows in after Ian and insists on cleaning up, to which no one objects. Their visits to Stuttgart usually go along these lines, with a little room for variation in between. Ian’s always been gracious and welcoming to them, and Sophie is every bit as hospitable. She returns a few minutes later and slinks into the kitchen to wrap her arms around her husband. Donald makes faces at his brother over the dishes, and Sophie chats with Abel in German while Ian makes faces right back at his eldest brother.

“Just sickening, isn’t it? Their cuteness?” Bryn huffs dramatically at Hannibal’s shoulder, putting her back to the wall while he leans against the wide doorframe at the mouth of the kitchen.

“Well.”

“This is what you and Mischa look like to the rest of us, by the way. In case you were ever curious.”

Hannibal chuckles. “I have been, actually.”

“Observe,” she says with a grand wave of her hand to indicate the scene before them.

“We don’t…ah, we do actually, don’t we? With Lithuanian.” He hums thoughtfully. “But we don’t…oh, we do that as well.”

“Don’t fight it, Hanni-baby. It’s one of our favorite things about you.”

He presses his lips together. “Is it?”

“If it weren’t for her, I don’t think we’d understand the half of you.” She shrugs meaningfully. “Siblings are important.”

“Sometimes,” he cedes, watching her but trying not to be too obvious about his train of thought or how immediately he thinks of her older sister and then of their mother. The coloring on her face tells him he’s probably failed at keeping it from her, but at least she doesn’t look irate with him.

“Is Bedelia all right?” Hannibal overhears Sophie asking Donald once she’s detached her arms from around Ian’s neck.

In the meantime Abel and Ian have migrated to the other side of the kitchen and are comparing trade secrets on waffle recipes, which is hilarious to Hannibal because Ian has lived in Germany for years now and still hasn’t perfected the dish. Bryn elbows Hannibal right as she’s pushing off the wall to ostensibly join Sophie and Donald in conversation. Hannibal takes up the spot to Donald’s right and dries the dripping dishes just as he is finishing up with the last few forks and knives left over from their late dinner.

“We were so sorry to hear about her father,” Sophie says in a quiet tone that suggests reverence and something deeper Hannibal often can’t eloquently express with a single English word. “I told Ian she might not join us tonight.”

“She wanted to,” Bryn answers in Donald’s place. “It’s been a long night. I heard her say she might swing by in the morning with Randall.”

“Is Randall still with you?” she asks of their audio engineer with a wide smile. “I’m glad to hear it. He’s good for you. The right kind of serious—like Hannibal; he keeps you on track.”

Bryn gives Hannibal a flat look and Donald rolls his eyes.

“Thank you, Sophie,” he says gently, humbled by her praise. 

Her smile softens, barely there, and she rubs a hand self-consciously over her stomach. Hannibal’s eyes drop instinctively to categorize the movement, and when he brings his eyes back up to meet hers there’s an alarmed awareness in her face that shocks the breath out of him.

“Oh,” he says, startling himself and her equally, it seems.

“Shh,” she warns him with a sternly pointing finger.

She weaves in between Donald and Bryn and quickly crosses the room to her husband. He and Abel are laughing at a joke that ends with “—but it wasn’t a haberdashery!” that Hannibal vaguely remembers but is sure doesn’t include him. Actually he thinks it’s an anecdote from Ian and Donald’s childhood, which would explain why it’s so familiar but not wholly memorable. Sophie says something to Ian in German—the words too fast and low for Hannibal to hear. Abel’s forehead wrinkles, and he gives Donald and then Bryn and Hannibal a confounded look.

They, in turn, shake their heads to communicate their same befuddlement. Hannibal laces his fingers together and waits. Ian stretches his arm across Sophie’s shoulders and says, “Well…”

“We’re pregnant,” Sophie finishes for him in one choked declaration.

For just a moment they are all silent, breath bated and lips twitching into smiles that comprehend before their minds can. Abel breaks that quiet to say—to marvel, really, “How wonderful.”

“Oh, my God, Ian,” Donald blurts out a second later, staggering to clear the few steps that separate him from his brother to hug him tightly. “Oh, you’re making me look bad,” he laughs joyfully, tearfully. He pulls back just enough to get a look at Sophie and holds one arm out to her, the other still around Ian’s neck. “Come here, you.”

Bryn laughs into her hand and Hannibal bumps her shoulder with his, smiling at the tears welled up in her eyes. As with Donald’s, they’re an expression of happiness. Abel comes around the mass of family members to stand at Ian’s side and shakes his hand when Donald eventually releases him. While the four of them negotiate embraces, Hannibal and Bryn give their congratulations. Sophie hasn’t begun to show yet, but she already has that radiance about her that Hannibal had carelessly overlooked as a natural feature of her usually understated beauty.

Donald looks to be far more overwhelmed than his brother and sister-in-law but wears a peaceful smile on his face the whole way back to the hotel. Every so often Hannibal looks over, and only once he catches sight of a tear tracking down Donald’s cheek. Hannibal and the others speak around him. It’s comfortable.

Bedelia is asleep when they get back up to their rooms. Randall answers the door to their shared room in wrinkled jeans and a t-shirt bearing an artistic rendering of Janis Joplin. It reminds Hannibal of the tattoo over Will’s ribs, and although the happy news of the Sutcliffes expecting their second child takes precedence, it has Hannibal feeling homesick and sentimental. Randall grins at their update and promises to tell Bedelia first thing in the morning.

By the time Hannibal wakes up the next day, Randall and Bedelia have made off to breakfast with the Sutcliffes. Donald and Abel went with them, which Hannibal uses as an excuse to plunder their room for his favorite guitar of Donald’s—the Yamaha FG730S, or as Donald calls her, Thalassa. Bryn goes with him and takes out the LS36 A.R.E., lovingly dubbed Wrecker. It’s not Bryn’s first choice, but she isn’t one to complain over having her second favorite guitar in her lap on a Wednesday morning, especially not before breakfast. 

They sit outside with Donald’s guitars—bless his impractical spirit—and quietly play through four Queen songs, a Beatles piece, and one labored rendition of “Miss You” by the Rolling Stones all before ordering breakfast.

“That’s the song we played at La Fin Absolue du Monde,” she says matter-of-factly after he’s called room service.

He quirks an eyebrow and sets the phone down on the receiver. The morning air has a cold bite to it when he steps outside again. The drop in temperature has gotten to the polished wood and chilled it when he pulls Thalassa back into his lap. Her cherry finish catches in the risen sun, plum on the outside and warm orange in the center of the full-bodied instrument.

“We covered the Rolling Stones that night?”

She sighs and thumbs at Wrecker’s low E and A strings. “Honestly, Hannibal, do you forget everything important?”

“Of course not,” he objects sulkily.

“You can’t remember meeting Will for the first time, you can’t remember _anything_ about that conference, you forget about the Stones songs—yes, plural, we played two. Well, me, Don, Deely, and Abel did. You _left_ mid-set to hook up with tall, dark, and clumsy.”

Hannibal surprises them both by laughing loudly and clapping his hand over his mouth to stifle the impulse. He recaptures his composure and asks, “Are you suggesting I have a problem?”

“Do you?” she asks mysteriously, wagging her eyebrows at him and being quite obtuse and unhelpful.

“I _do_ recall seeing his lecture and meeting him. What does it matter if I can’t remember the rest of the evening?”

Bryn gives him a long, conflicted look. She opens her mouth as if to say something but averts her eyes and changes her mind. Her shoulders bunch up in a slow, cautious shrug. “I guess it doesn’t.”

He’s about to ask why she’s taken on such a serious tone, but a knock comes at the door and she flies into the room to get it. They have a quick meal of Schlackwurst, Camembert cheese, and laugenstangen. She drinks coffee and he has orange juice. When the hours align favorably between his time zone and Will’s, he detours into the room to call him. Will snuffles and Bryn plays on the other side of the glass door—it sounds like “Summertime”.

“M’hullo,” Will mumbles, probably rolling around in bed sheets, entangling his limbs and ruffling his hair…

“Good morning.”

Will makes a noise in between a chuckle and a groan. He slurs, more asleep than awake in his grunted reply, “Hi, sweetheart.”

“Did I beat your alarm?”

“By a few minutes.” Will yawns. “’S not a big deal.”

“How was your night?”

“Hmm, was good, um…” Another yawn cuts through his beleaguered response. “Took the dogs running with Mischa. She came down to see this painting Abigail did, and I made dinner while they were amazing around me.”

Hannibal smiles and traces small circles on the back of his phone.

“It was fish, so Abigail let me do it.”

“I’m sure you were a very good host,” Hannibal says approvingly.

Outside he hears Bryn singing in her deep, resonant voice, _“…take to the sky. But ‘til that morning, there ain’t nothing can harm you…with Daddy and Mama standin’ by…”_

“I held my own.” Will clears his throat and shuffles around, probably sitting up. The radio blares for two seconds before Will silences it. “I think I changed the radio station in my sleep again.”

“Perhaps your house is haunted.”

“Ugh, no,” Will moans to the tune of more fabric rustling. “Don’t tell me that.”

“Either that or your dogs are playing tricks on you.”

Will laughs, a rumbling, delicious sort of sound that Hannibal likes very much. He says, “Did I ever tell you that Abigail sabotaged my coffee stash when she first came to live with me?”

“You didn’t, no.” Hannibal brings his feet up onto the bed with him.

“Okay, I think you actually know this about me, but I mix things up a lot when I’ve just woken up—putting my shirt on backward, forgetting it altogether, et cetera. Well, one morning the coffee came out really sour. I thought I’d made it wrong, so I went through and did it again and it came out just as awful if not worse. I think I was still on the Percocet, so I was standing there in the kitchen in my underwear for a good hour remaking coffee and cleaning out the machine.”

“I’m picturing you in your underwear and now I can’t focus on anything,” Hannibal says, electing to be honest. 

Will sighs. “You’re lucky you’re pretty.”

Hannibal grins and runs a hand through his hair. Bryn continues to sing outside—a different song, it sounds like. He listens for the lyrics and catches, _“The days grow short when you reach September. When the autumn weather turns the leaves to flame…”_

“I gotta hop in the shower,” Will mumbles.

“Do excellent work today.”

“Yes, sir,” he yawns.

“You’re brilliant at what you do, and I miss you.”

An abbreviating pause cuts the edges off Hannibal’s words and makes the delivery feel all the more abrupt and winded. He panics, just a little bit.

Everything about Will frightens and exhilarates him and kick starts the roiling, simmering flurry of sometimes-butterflies, sometimes-earthquakes in Hannibal’s belly. If there were a way to articulate it without sounding quite so foolishly enamored…well, it probably wouldn’t be worth sharing, come to think of it.

He’s afraid to say it anyway, close to the chest as it is. He had let himself believe that nothing could strike the match head of fear in his heart after their talk of harmful pasts. It seemed such a big, all-encompassing thing to have it known and accepted between the two of them; what was done to them was done, but would never be gone. Even as the horrors persist, the light and redemption of love, regardless of its form, has to continue in tandem with the bad, with the terrible, with the repugnant.

And so much of it had been repugnant. So much of it had been deplorable, sullying, and cruel.

The rest of it had been calm, patient, nourishing. The rest of it is his family—Mischa, Oba and uncle, the memories he has kept of his parents, Bonaventure who taught him to cook, Nemean Lion, and…

“Hannibal, are you there?”

“Hmm? Yes.” He swallows. “I’m here, Will.”

“I was just saying that I love you.”

Hannibal closes his eyes around the force of the blush creeping down his nose and into his cheeks, following the lines of his veins as they traverse the column of his neck. The rush of his blood to accommodate him makes his head spin and his heart flutter in his chest. Hannibal murmurs, “I was thinking it.”

“Should I say it again?” Will asks shyly with a hint of teasing that aggravates the heat in Hannibal’s face.

“Yes, please.”

Will breathes slowly in and out, a soothing wash of sound like a wave rolling up over the shore or like wind glossing through ripened autumn leaves like the ones in Bryn’s song. He says, “I love you, Hannibal.”

Hannibal closes his eyes again. “I love you, too.”

Will hums, sounding pleased and luxuriant, and Hannibal wants to live and breathe and sleep in the chorus of Will’s lungs—the gentle music of his soft breathing, the lull of his yawn hungry for sleep, the crackle of his throat in the morning when he speaks before realizing he’s awake. It’s such a wildly fanatical ache in Hannibal’s throat that he has to wait for the tide to ebb before saying, “Have a good day at work, Will.”

“I’ll call you later?”

“Yes.”

“Bye, Hannibal.”

He drops his hands to his legs and keeps his fingers in a loose hold over the phone, ambling through a jumble of thoughts and wordless imagined pictures. Bryn is looking at him through the glass door when he snaps himself out of his daze. She drops her eyes a moment later and resumes playing as if there had been no interruption and sings, “I mean the night my baby left me. You know the rain was pouring down. I was the most bluest girl in this whole Chicago town.”

The door had been left partially open when he came inside to call Will, but it isn’t a point of concern. Bryn doesn’t tease him about being in love—not since the initial shock of it wore off. The group as a whole might like to taunt him in the name of camaraderie, but Bryn’s come from a different background than the rest of them did. Hannibal has learned to expect a very considerate brand of humor and companionship from her, which he reciprocates the best that he can.

“I got a brand new babe,” Bryn continues to sing, smirking at him over Wrecker as he rejoins her outside. “He just as sweet as a man can be. Oh, Lord, I got a brand new man—he just as sweet as an apple on a tree.”

In the spirit of her seasonal song selection thus far, they play Sonny Boy Williams’ “Nine Below Zero” and tire themselves out sometime in the late afternoon. They leave the following morning for Hanover.

Hannibal bides his time in between flights and performances fine tuning the short list of songs Bryn has taught him for the guitar and stealing from Donald’s collection at every opportunity. One morning in Paris Hannibal goes with Donald to Les Prairies de Bercy. Donald carries his guitar on his back and Hannibal takes his by the handle. They sit on the concrete steps heading the open green space and play a fingerstyle arrangement of the Godfather Waltz. 

It’s after a long session of intermittent playing and people-watching that Hannibal mentions his conversation with Mischa and her suggestion that they take a break soon. Donald welcomes the idea, though he looks unsure. It isn’t until a few days later after they’ve had a few beers on- and off-stage in Lille that they revisit the topic.

“Have you talked about it to the others?” Hannibal asks him as they navigate shadowy streets, half-drunk.

“Hm? Oh, I talked to everyone. Bryn’s got…artistic aspirations she wants to explore, at Vilnia.”

“Mischa told me about that, yes.” Hannibal nods.

“Bedelia, well, I don’t blame her for wanting to get away from this for a while. She’s talked about going to Prague before, for kicks, you know? She likes this international stuff.” Donald shrugs. “ _You’ve_ got a hunky man waiting for you at home, who you’ll be seeing _tomorrow_ , in fact.”

Hannibal smiles in spite of himself.

“Abel’s content to do anything life throws at him right now,” Donald continues wistfully, sighing. “Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to take a step back from all this. We’ve been at it such a long damn time now.”

Donald elbows Hannibal when his smile persists, and Hannibal elbows him back. He asks, “And what will you do with your freedom then, Donald?”

“Bother my brothers, probably.” He smirks. “No, well, Martin and Elliott have been talking about a live album, and you know Randall’s been aching for something new to remaster since the last studio album sold. He’s got a real gift, that one. We’re a lucky bunch.”

“He does, yes, and we are.” Hannibal nods and gets his arm around Donald’s back to walk with him in the vague direction of the hotel. “It was smart of us to invest in him.”

“His birthday’s coming up. What’re you getting the little shit?”

Hannibal laughs at the fondly given name—a true endearment coming from Donald’s lips—and says, “A drawing of a Chinese reptilian wing, and perhaps I will invite him to use my home studio the next time we are in Baltimore.”

“He really likes dinosaurs, doesn’t he?” Donald chuckles.

“I believe he went to school to be a paleontologist. He would have seen it through if he hadn’t discovered a love of music instead.”

“Probably could have done any old thing he wanted, genius that he is.”

“What will you get him?”

“A shiny new guitar, maybe? What does he need?” He shakes his head. “I want to get him something he needs.”

“Is he fond of animals?”

“What, like a Labrador retriever? I wouldn’t want to take that risk—just for the dog’s sake. I hate it when people take animals back after adopting them.” He pauses thoughtfully. “I should find him a girlfriend.”

“Randall is gay.”

“I should find him a boyfriend,” Donald revises without missing a beat. “But gay? How do I not know this about him? How do you know this?”

“He came out to Bedelia’s family while he was still enrolled at university. My sister and I were there when it happened.”

“Huh, well, I’m going to find him a boyfriend.”

“Is that the best idea? You were the one who introduced Bedelia to Isaac.”

“Okay,” he says shortly, waving his hand. “Isaac was a special case, and you know it. He had a lot going on in his life at the time; I thought they’d be good for each other.”

They walk a ways further, and Donald stumbles once over some loose gravel.

“Not that I’m relinquishing the task, but if I were to get him something other than a boyfriend, what do you think? He has a thing about electronics, doesn’t he?”

“I’ve seen him spend hours with a car battery, taking it apart and putting it back together,” Hannibal says with a shrug. “Find a way to combine advanced mechanics with music, and I’m sure he will be pleased.”

Donald snorts. “We’re talking about the guy who smiled for days after Bryn got him those colorful socks with cartoon bears on them for Christmas five years ago. This shouldn’t be hard.”

“You care for him,” Hannibal sighs. “That makes it hard.”

He sees Donald gearing up to retort and beats him to the punch by clarifying, “He was so pleased to get that gift from her because he had told her a story earlier that year from his childhood—of a bear cub he saw on a camping trip.”

“Oh, yeah, yeah,” Donald says with a vigorous nod. “Yeah, I remember. He got poison ivy all over him trying to get a better look. That’s why they—”

“—they were green,” they say together, laughing.

A group of young people passes them up on the other side of the street, talking excitedly among themselves but not to the point of being rowdy. Donald watches them go for a moment and then directs his attention up at the sky, a morose look on his face that Hannibal has seen often enough to know what Donald is thinking before he speaks to confirm his suspicions. It takes him longer than it usually does to voice his concern. Hannibal slows their joint pace to give Donald room to focus and get his thoughts in order.

“Do you ever worry that there’s nothing for us outside of this?” he asks quietly. It’s sobering, the dull flame of fear kindled in the flush of his cheeks and the red tips of his ears. All his charisma gone, Donald looks his age. “What if we don’t know how to do anything else?”

“None of that,” Hannibal chides him evenly. “You and I are going to open up a restaurant in Baltimore with chains all over the country, and Bryn will demand free drinks and I’ll throw linseeds at you when you burn all the bread.”

“I can hold my own in a kitchen, thank you very much,” Donald sniffs, though he’s smiling.

“Why else would I want to open a restaurant with you?” Hannibal asks seriously.

There’s a stalled moment of hesitant silence, and Donald asks, “You’re really going to open a restaurant?”

“Doesn’t it seem logical?” Hannibal asks with the perfect amount of casual aloofness in his voice for this not to be a frightening conversation—what with Hannibal never having spoken of his plans out loud before. To anyone. Ever.

“Well, yeah.” Donald shrugs. “You’re a better chef than most of the ones we encounter anywhere else, and…you’ve got to figure that even if you weren’t loaded, Deely would probably help you cover the costs of getting started. It’s not a bad plan, all things considered.”

“I agree.” He catches Donald’s eye. “You have always been an exemplary businessman. I would trust that element of it with you more than I would trust myself.”

Hannibal is still blurry enough with drink that he doesn’t scream his horror when Donald takes the idea to the group for judgment as soon as they make it back to the hotel. His fears are mostly unfounded, just as Donald’s uncertainty about his future was unfounded—arisen as they were out of self-conscious doubt above anything else.

Bedelia tells them they’re ridiculous when she hears their half-cocked plan, but she smiles as she says it. That small genuine smile is just as good as verbal encouragement in Hannibal’s book. True to Hannibal’s prediction, Bryn says she backs them if there are free drinks in it for her, which gets Donald started on an entire business layout for the whole project. He’s been behind most of their marketing and numbers since the very beginning, so Donald has a firm grasp of what he’s talking about. If Randall could have been an engineer, Donald easily could have been a wolf on Wall Street.

Hannibal finishes Randall’s drawing that night so it will be ready by the next time they see each other for the Minsk show in Belarus and nurses his burgeoning hangover in the morning—the morning of the Lyon show. He calls Will a few hours before they go on while he’s supposed to be practicing. Will seizes the opportunity to tell him about his first session with the orchestra: his opinion on Miriam’s music selection, his general impression of the first chairs, and the alien feeling of waving the baton for the first time in front of a group that large.

“You wouldn’t believe this group, Hannibal,” Will says breathlessly, sounding just exhilarated and warm and happy. “They’re talented. They play _so_ well together and individually.”

“Have you thought to add anyone new? Or are you satisfied with the players you’ve been given?”

“Oh, I’ve thought about it, but I like everybody I’ve got. I _like_ them, Hannibal, and they’re professionals.” He laughs, “It’s goddamn incredible. This whole thing is just incredible.”

Hannibal smiles into the receiver, thumbing the curve of his saxophone where it rests on his lap. “I’m happy for you, Will.”

“Thank you,” he says softly, reverently. “Tonight’s the Lyon show, right?”

“Yes, it is.”

“And you’ll be coming home tomorrow,” Will replies, sounding doubly gratified.

“Late in the day tomorrow,” Hannibal confirms. “Are we still on for dinner at yours?”

“Yes. Abigail and I probably won’t go hunting until the weekend when I have a bit more time on my hands. How does steak sound? It’s one of about a dozen things I do really well.”

Hannibal’s smile parts around a laugh. “It sounds lovely, Will.”

Will sighs, sounding comfortable and settled in. “How has the tour been treating you?”

“It’s funny you should ask.”

“Is it?”

Hannibal thinks he hears Will smiling.

“We’ve decided unofficially to take a break from the band after the tour comes to a close in December.”

“Oh,” Will says, sounding surprised. “Is that something you’ve been discussing for a while?”

“We’ve avoided it, for the most part, but we all want to explore different things.”

“Have you thought about leaving the band permanently? Is that in the works?”

“No, nothing to that effect is set in stone—not for right now. It’s only that…change can be good for a person.”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

“Am I keeping you from work, Will?”

“Uh, not especially. We’re on lunch right now. I’ve got time.”

“I should let you get back,” Hannibal says gently. “You have a habit of not eating your lunch when you’re distracted.”

“What? I—well, maybe sometimes.”

There’s a pause, and faintly Hannibal can hear something scraping like plastic on plastic. He smirks.

“When are you going on?” Will asks.

“In a few hours.”

“I’ll text you, okay?” he says around a mouthful of something. “Something sexy.”

Hannibal laughs. “If you insist.”

Twenty minutes before he has to leave for a late dinner and sound checks, Will sends him a picture of a small dog with an underbite standing on hind legs. Just out of the shot Will’s hand can be seen holding a scrap of meat. Hannibal laughs for an hour.

The Lyon show goes as expected. Hannibal and Bedelia speak predominantly French for the audience, and they love it. She drums like a maniac, Donald croons melancholically, Abel and Bryn have their own conversation going between his keyboard and her bass, and Hannibal mediates between all of them, intersecting and merging and dividing anywhere and everywhere his notes are needed. Some of it’s scripted; a lot of it is improvised.

Many of their songs, for example, have been translated into the various languages learned between the five of them. Sometimes their lyrics they consistently perform in English since that is their popular language of distribution, but for less popular songs that aren’t promoted on radio stations or online they’ll follow the language of the land. Hannibal attributes much of their international success to that diversity—that they aren’t an English-speaking, All-American band bringing nothing but Western values and ideologies with them everywhere they go.

One fan they met in Lithuania cried when Donald signed her shirt. She told him his accent was terrible but that the translations were lovely, and Hannibal had laughed and patted Donald on the back—delighting, for once, in his being the only speaker of his native lietuvių kalba.

They play a moody rendition of “Summertime”. It’s a saxophonist’s dream in front of a crowd this big. Their next piece is one Bryn wrote with a very strong piano part that Abel just dominates from start to finish. Hannibal loses himself in Abel’s playing more than he ever can in his own, concentrated as his focus needs to be. Abel is a lot like Will when he plays—totally devoted to the sound, swaddled in it to the point of being trapped but for the need to play on and play well.

Near the end of their set, Donald announces “Five Rivers Wide”, Hannibal’s contribution to their most recent studio album. He lets himself sink into his part and those of everyone else’s, feeling them all as separate but intertwined machines emitting music like breath or raw energy—both, in fact. Breath and raw energy.

It goes well until near the end with the final crescendo. He hears the build climbing and climbing and then judders to a stop when he hears the undercurrent of the rhythm drop out. His eyes fall open and he looks around, rigidly continuing but moving to the edge of the stage where he last saw Bryn standing. Donald locks eyes with him as he slings his saxophone around his flank and bends over the ledge that drops off about five feet.

Hannibal swears in that instant that they communicate one singular thought, with varying inflections: _The show must go on._

Donald sings into the microphone, impassioned, and Bedelia and Abel accommodate for Hannibal and Bryn’s temporary loss by changing the time signature around Donald’s sustained note. A security guard in between the stage and the front line of the audience hoists Bryn up into Hannibal’s arms with ease. The way Bryn’s staring at the man’s arms suggests to Hannibal that the adrenaline from the song broke most of her fall.

Her bass—not her primary but one of only a handful that she owns—lies in two pieces on the ground below: a severed neck clinging to the awkwardly abandoned body by two lank strings. Hannibal sits with Bryn on the edge of the stage with his legs hanging over and improvises to the end. Bryn sings at his side and waves at those in the front who can see them while the security guard who helped her up lurks somewhere to their left.

The second the song ends the lights go up, bright and jarring. Bryn tries to stand on her own but favors her right side substantially. She asks for another bass to be brought out, but Abel forces her to go backstage and ice her ankle for the last few songs. They bring in Randall in the meantime since he knows their music inside and out and can play most instruments in the same manner that Will can—except he’s studied most of the ones he knows and had acquired proficiency organically over the course of many years. Backstage Bryn gushes at Hannibal, red-faced and out of breath and grateful that they didn’t make a big fuss and “mess up the show” over her.

His _instinct_ had been to cut the music and dive off the stage after her once he saw that she’d fallen over the side. Donald steadies him when he makes to rant about it, wary of Bryn’s condition. Since they have Randall go with them to wrap up the show, Martin agrees to drive her to the hospital in their place.

They get through the rest of the night with everyone else intact and check in with Bryn afterward. Some of the fans send flowers backstage when Donald tells security it’s all right, and even then, every parcel is searched before they’re passed on from the staff to the band members. Donald and Bedelia sit up front in their spacious rental car—since they have two weeks ahead of them in France after tonight, they figured it wouldn’t hurt to have a vehicle at their disposal—and Hannibal, Abel, and Randall cram themselves into the backseat with the flowers that wouldn’t fit in the trunk.

Bryn is thrilled at the sight of them. Randall had the bad luck of being sat in between Hannibal and Abel and consequently ends up with flowers artfully braided into his hair. Hannibal learned to braid from his sister, and Abel learned to do it from his ex-wife, Katya. In their younger years together they had wanted a daughter. Bryn only sprained her ankle, but her charts haven’t come back by the time they go to see her. It isn’t until the black morning hours that they find out she is, for the most part, fighting fit.

Hannibal takes pictures with his phone, remembering that Will expressed curiosity about the crew behind the Lion in the airport when Hannibal left Baltimore the last time. Randall doesn’t notice him snapping away, but Bryn does and laughs until she accidentally jostles her ankle.

“When is your flight, Hannibal?” she asks him when the hospital staff finally sends them packing.

He checks his watch. “In about four hours.”

“Will you tell him I said hello?” She fumbles with the crutches at her arms and makes a face when her hair catches on its metal fixtures. Her hair has gotten longer than she’s used to having it since they’ve begun this tour. “The Hobbs girl, too. And Mischa, of course.”

“Yes,” Hannibal promises, locking eyes with Bedelia, Donald, and Abel to extend that answer to them as well. He looks at Randall and says, “I’ll be back before your birthday.”

“Seeing as we’re scheduled to be in Kiev for my birthday this year, I really hope so,” Randall says calmly with an amiable kind of distance in his eyes. “Bedelia said your tradition for Kiev is weird, even for Donald.”

“What is that supposed to mean!” Donald protests, though his mouth grins and his eyes shine.

“You know what it means,” Bedelia says flatly.

Bryn snorts. “We all know what it means.”

“Okay, just get in the car, Hop-along,” Donald mutters, ushering Bryn into the front seat. There are still loose flowers strewn across the backseat and on the floor of the car. Hannibal looks, and there are still two clinging to Randall’s shaggy hair that haven’t fallen out yet. He’ll need a haircut soon, too.

“I’ll ride with Martin,” Hannibal offers, calculating the ratio of seats to people and coming up short. “Donald?”

“Yep,” he says, tossing the keys off to Bedelia.

Randall and Abel slide into the backseat and Hannibal sees Abel bringing another flower to Randall’s hair before the doors slam shut on the image. The band’s stage manager, Elliott Buddish, has since arrived to talk logistics with Martin outside the hospital, so Hannibal and Donald wait with their hands in their pockets and a light rain spritzing around them.

“Want a smoke?” Donald asks with a shrug.

“Sure.”

“Maybe I shouldn’t ask,” he says, fiddling a pack out of his back pocket. “You’ve been cutting back lately.”

“Have I?”

“Yeah, ever since that show in Oberhausen.”

“I’m surprised you remember so well,” Hannibal says around the thin filter between his lips.

“Is that because you _don’t_ remember it?” Donald teases.

“In Oberhausen we played “Georgia on My Mind”,” Hannibal says without missing a beat.

Donald smiles and ducks his head. “After every show up until that night you smoked half a pack before calling it a night. I remember because Bryn always gives you a hard time for feeding your lungs cancer, and out here you only smoke regular old smoke-smelling cigarettes instead of those fancy ones she likes better.” Donald exhales a cloud of it. “But that night you didn’t need ‘em.”

Hannibal tips his head back and blows smoke rings into the blue-black sky above them. He’d missed this brand of neutralization.

“Do I need them now?” he asks, smoke trickling out the sides of his mouth.

“Bryn got hurt, and you’re angry about how it happened,” Donald explains easily like it’s the simplest thing in the world. Hannibal supposes it is. “I’m angry, too. Bryn hates being infantilized, but she’s the baby of the group. Her and Randall,” Donald clarifies, pointing his finger for emphasis. “That’s why we put flowers in his hair, and that’s why Bryn knows about my bad poetry and what songs to teach you to take back to Will.”

“You’re right,” Hannibal says softly.

Donald takes a long drag off his cigarette and sighs, turning his head and shaping his lips at the tail end of his exhale to blow the last of it away. Hannibal watches it dissipate in the dewy pre-dawn night.

“You could be there for the birth of your brother’s second child,” Hannibal murmurs, watching the embers at the lit end of his cigarette and breathing in the caress of rain enveloping them.

He crouches to press his cigarette into the wet sidewalk and flicks the butt into a trash receptacle a few feet off from where they’re standing. Elliott laughs at something Martin says. Hannibal thinks they’ll be ready to go soon. Donald’s looking off the other way when Hannibal returns his attention to him, a bit too stubbornly to look natural. He brings his eyes forward, cigarette burning still but only half-consumed. The lighting isn’t too bad in the front of the hospital that Hannibal can’t see Donald’s eyes shine with tears.

He looks at Hannibal then and smiles. In a strong voice he says, “It would have been nice to have some kids.”

Hannibal returns his smile and claps his hand on Donald’s shoulder.

“Donald, I’m fairly certain you have at least one child.”

“Oh!” Donald bats his hand away, but he’s laughing as he does it. One tear escapes as he’s shaking his head. “You know what I mean.”

“Yes.”

Donald drops his gaze and puts out his cigarette, following Hannibal’s example and tossing it in the trash. He says, “Kenny’s going to be a great big brother.”

“The best,” Hannibal agrees.

“You guys good to go? Who’s riding with me?” Elliott shouts as he’s already making his way to the car.

“Martin?” Donald says, walking with Hannibal toward the parking lot.

“Doesn’t matter to me. I’m headed back to the hotel. Elliott’s going back to the venue.”

“With you it is, then.”

Hannibal uses his one hour to sleep and then rides with Elliott to the airport. He is the only one among them still awake at that point, and he seems even happy to do it, albeit running on fumes and caffeine.

“You gonna see this guy I keep hearing about?” he asks once they get to Lyon Saint-Exupery International in their sights.

“Will Graham,” Hannibal supplies, eyes on the road in the event that Elliott collapses in his exhaustion.

“Right, right, guy from Washington.” The car swerves, and Elliott hisses through his teeth. He mutters, “This is why I was born in America—because I drive like an American and like fried foods.”

He clearly hasn’t slept a wink.

“Will isn’t from Washington,” Hannibal corrects him lightly, taking his eyes off the road for a second and then redirecting his gaze when Elliott returns his glance.

“Well, that’s where you met, isn’t it? At that conference in Virginia. He gave a lecture on, uh…pitch simultaneity.” He snaps his fingers. “Yeah, that was it. He had all those edgy pictures up and didn’t stick around to talk to anyone. Kind of a savant air about him.”

“You were there,” Hannibal says, understanding. His first guess had been that one of the others told Elliott about the conference in passing, but he speaks about it as if from memory.

“Well, yeah, hard to forget a night like that.” Elliott laughs. “It’s not often we get to rumble these days.”

Hannibal frowns, perplexed. “What are you talking about?”

“You and that creep of an ex-boyfriend,” Elliott says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. Hannibal supposes it must be. “He was there with this whole gang of sneering cronies in overpriced suits, and…you know. He came over trying to talk to you, but Bryn and Don got on his case real fast.”

Hannibal blinks as the memory returns to him, first in sparks and strobes of light and then in lashes and then in waves and then in gusts: how it started so slowly like an event that would never end and how it escalated like a brush fire in the desert—volatile, dangerous, violent, destructive…

Things he hadn’t been in years, not since he was a teenager.

“I’d never seen you so angry before, Jesus Christ,” Elliott murmurs, eyeing Hannibal out of the side of his eye. “I mean, to be fair, you don’t get angry where other people can see, usually, so when you took a swing at the guy my whole concept of you flipped. You _broke his nose_. I didn’t know you had it in you.”

“Don’t sound so impressed,” Hannibal hears himself say.

“It’s hard not to be, man. Mischa’s told us all that you’ve studied martial arts and whatnot since you were a kid, but that never really translated. Not that you have to be violent to fight well—”

“I am _not_ …” Hannibal makes himself stop. He steadies himself with a breath. “…violent.”

Elliott placates him without sarcasm or humor. “All right, I know you aren’t.” He tips his chin and waves with one hand. Visibly exercising caution he says, “But for the record, Don told me about him, okay? Sounds like the jerk got what he deserved.”

The gusts of resurgent memory haven’t stopped. They coalesce and drag Hannibal to a time long past, when he was a boy choking back miserable tears in his family’s kitchen. Men laughing and throwing little candies at him while Grutas twisted his arm behind his back at just the right angle with just shy off too much pressure. Mischa in their shared room, ignored as long as they had him to torment.

One of them, Dieter, used to curse at Hannibal in German. It was years before Hannibal learned what he had said to him.

_You deserve it, you little fuck, you deserve all of this, you’re shit you’re less than shit do you understand me you dirty little beast._

Kolnas in English but sometimes Russian. Grentz and Milko in Lithuanian, threatening him, humiliating him.

And Grutas.

 _Eik paciulpk minedui,_ he would whisper in Hannibal’s ear, like it was a secret between just the two of them, like he knew Hannibal would wake with that insult playing in his mind again and again for years to come. Vivid as if it were yesterday. Raw as if no time at all had gone by.

“Here we are,” Elliott says from somewhere very far away—a cloud maybe.

Hannibal mumbles, “What?”

“The airport? You all right?”

“Yes, I’m fine.”

He wonders if that’s ever been true, if it’s true now as he’s saying it. It burns in him like a lie.

“Have a safe trip, Hannibal. Give us a call when you land?”

“I will.”

 _Will_ , he thinks.

_Will._

Hannibal takes his one carry-on bag—the rest having been left with the band—and goes to his gate. He sends Mischa a text and then he sends a more basic one to Will before powering down the electronics he has on hand and boarding the plane.

It’s thirteen hours from Lyon to Washington Dulles. Thirteen hours for Hannibal to get it together.

 _Forty years hasn’t been enough,_ he thinks miserably as the seatbelt light goes on.

He tries to remember what Will said that night before they shared their stories—before Hannibal told him the bare bones of what he’d been through as an orphaned child in the care of a cruel, abusive man. He tries to summon that poignant thing Will told him after remarking on the inevitability of their ending up together that Hannibal had found so comforting at the time that he hadn’t stopped to consider the responsibilities he came with—the ruin, the weight, the wounds, the scars that he cherished but could never count on other people to appreciate.

 _All it took was the traumatic,_ he thinks is what Will had said, smiling, fed, glassy-eyed, and beautiful. Alive though the universe had seen fit to test him just as it had thought to test Hannibal. _Nothing brings people together like tragedy._

Hannibal closes his eyes and sleeps after ten minutes in the air. He dreams he’s at the conference in Washington four years ago. Will walks away from him into the shadowy parking lot, and as Hannibal tries to go after him, someone grabs him from behind and pulls him backward into the darkened building while he screams and struggles and fights back. And when his hand comes away bloody, he sees Mason looking back at him with his signature malicious grin, only his face is wrong. The texture, the wet glisten of it, consumes Hannibal’s vision, and he jerks awake to Mason’s voice in his head saying, _Eik paciulpk minedui._

His nail beds ache from where his fingers have been digging into his thighs. His jaw aches from gritting his teeth. The French woman sitting next to him asks if he’s all right. He tells her he’ll be better when they’re grounded. It’s as honest an answer as he can give.

The plane lands in Frankfurt at a quarter past eight in the morning. Eleven and a half hours to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **The German:**  
>  **Thank you Salyiha, bby. <3
> 
> “Hello, Kenny,” Hannibal says when the bright-eyed toddler boldly advances upon him.
> 
> “Hi,” he says after a moment’s assessment. He has the moose by its antlers and the lion by the throat; the look on his face is open and trusting. It’s nothing short of comical.
> 
> “How are you?”
> 
> Kenny shrugs, calmly unsmiling but pleasant in demeanor. He says, “Good.”
> 
> “Your uncle and Abel gave those to you,” Hannibal observes in the name of conversation—speaking English before he can catch himself and not bothering to translate since Kenny is in the process of learning both. He has a creeping suspicion that if Will were here, he would make it his mission to befriend him.
> 
> Will with his dark curls and modest attire; Will with his tendency for picking up strays; Will with his adopted daughter in everything but name; Will with his love for dogs and his easy alliance with Mischa…
> 
> Will.
> 
> “Uncle and Grandma,” Kenny corrects him, eyes sparking with recognition and something endearingly close to pure happiness. Hannibal’s seen it in him from their earliest encounter just three weeks following the boy’s birth. He has always been a happy child. “Oma Abba.”
> 
> Hannibal bites his lip to repress an unrefined snort, and someone places a hand on his shoulder. He turns and finds none other than Oma Abba wearing an expression of total affection—and resignation—on his usually stoic face. Abel squeezes Hannibal’s shoulder and turns fond eyes on Kenny, now meticulously twisting the lion’s mane into skinny spikes with childishly pudgy fingers.
> 
> “Is your uncle bothering you, little sparrow?”
> 
> “No.” He shakes his head and drops the moose and Abel swoops down to get it for him. Kenny secures it under one arm so he can continue to style the long threads in his small, chubby fingers. “Uncle’s nice.”
> 
> Abel smiles. “He’d better be.”
> 
> “Kenny,” his mother calls when she spots him from her perch by the fireplace. Hannibal watches her hand a nearly full glass off to Ian and steps aside when she approaches. Her eyes are bright and her mouth relaxed and smiling as she looks from them to her son. “Is it bedtime?”
> 
> “No,” Kenny says slowly, his answer half a question. He looks very, adorably guilty.
> 
> He didn’t inherit her dark hair, but his sharp hazel eyes are Sophie’s entirely. She smiles and crouches to be at level with him. She taps the moose under his arm and he hands it off with a wide, sweeping gesture common enough to young children.
> 
> “Is Moose sleepy?” she asks—the picture of knowing patience.
> 
> Abel gives Hannibal a completely besotted look at the contemplative look on Kenny’s face. After a lengthy pause he finally says, with the confidential air of divulging a dangerous secret, “Yes.”
> 
> Sophie runs her free hand through his hair. She tells him, “Come on then. To bed with you, honey.”
> 
> “Okay, Mama.”
> 
> “Say good night to Papa’s friends, huh?” She extracts the lion with its sadly misshapen halo of hair and waits for Kenny to hug both Abel and Hannibal before walking with him up the stairs to his room.
> 
> “Good night, Sophie,” Abel says for them both.
> 
> “Good night.”  
> \--
> 
> Thalassa  
> http://usa.yamaha.com/products/musical-instruments/guitars-basses/ac-guitars/fg/fg730s/
> 
> Wrecker  
> http://usa.yamaha.com/products/musical-instruments/guitars-basses/ac-guitars/l/ls36_are_02/?mode=model#tab=product_lineup
> 
> “Summertime” composed by George Gershwin
> 
> “September Song” composed by Kurt Weill and (lyrics) written Maxwell Anderson
> 
> “They Call Me Muddy Waters” by Muddy Waters
> 
> From Brett Ratner’s _Red Dragon_ : “I’m a dirty little beast, I’m a freak!”
> 
>  
> 
> Tave ten, brolite? > Are you there, brother?  
> Taip, sesute. > Yes, sister.
> 
> Eik paciulpk minedui > Fuck you


	23. Break the Spell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannibal’s homecoming doesn’t go quite as expected, but things get better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _I’ve got a hard heart / Since we’ve been apart / Can you break the spell? / Break it all down tonight_

“What do you think?” Abigail asks with her head tilted one way and Will’s tilted the other.

He steps closer and squints, hums once. “Well…”

“Looks a bit like Degas?” Alana suggests, straightening out and tossing a speculative glance in Beverly’s direction.

“Same kind of brushstrokes,” Beverly concedes, shrugging one shoulder and taking a big bite of one of the many oatmeal raisin cookies Abigail baked that morning. She nods and says, “Yeah, I could see that.”

“Degas is the one who painted all those dancers, right?” Will studies the painting a few seconds longer before checking Beverly and then Alana. The former watches him while chewing and the latter murmurs a vague agreement. He turns his gaze on Abigail who’s now critically studying her work. “It’s different from what you’ve been doing.”

“Yeah. It’s just that I got bored of landscapes and…the other stuff. Wanted to do something more tangible, you know?”

“What’s the other stuff?” Beverly asks with unwitting boldness, backing down straight away when Abigail’s back goes rigid at the question. She clocks Will’s apologetic half-shrug and tactfully changes the subject. “You’re sure you don’t want to come with us to the show, Will? They’re really good.”

The coaxing tone of Beverly’s guarantee sells him on the idea, but he remains immovable and tells her, “Hann’ll be coming back from a thirteen hour trip tonight. I just want to feed him and put him to bed.”

Alana smiles slyly and Beverly outright grins. Abigail peeks at him with a smirk to rival his colleagues’ expressions. His mouth drops open, wordless but helplessly affronted.

“ _Not_ for…” He presses his lips together and puts his hands on his hips, heaving a long-suffering sigh while they continue to stare knowingly at him. “I don’t know why I bother with you.”

“You love us,” Beverly sings.

Alana points and hums, biting into an especially raisin-flecked cookie. Muffled, she says, “That you do, Will. Sorry.”

He looks at Abigail and her smirk shifts mysteriously into a smile, but she doesn’t say anything. It warms his heart—that recklessly given display of agreement. He drops his eyes to hide his happy grin. “Well, I’m outnumbered then, clearly.”

“Clearly,” Abigail murmurs, locking eyes with him briefly.

Beverly leans her elbow on Will’s shoulder, casually insinuating her way in between them. She says, “Hey, if we want to beat traffic, we should probably head out now. If your rock star decides he doesn’t want to “sleep”, you’re more than welcome to bring him. Clarice is curious about him.”

In spite of the heat flooding his cheeks, he keeps his expression neutral. “I’ll let him know when I see him.”

“All right,” she muses, gifting him with a wink.

“Do you need to get dressed, Abigail?” Alana asks, stepping around Will’s side.

She looks down at her huge paint-spattered gray t-shirt and faded jeans, says, “Oh, I should.”

“We’ll get out of your hair,” Will offers, backing away toward the opened door. “I’ve got to get started on dinner anyway.” 

Alana and Beverly follow him out, Beverly hanging behind a moment to have a word with Abigail. Will adamantly distances himself from it, not wanting to overhear anything that’s not for him. He goes to the kitchen to verify that the steaks in the fridge haven’t magically turned into leprechauns and glances at Alana when she comes to stand with him at the sink.

“You’re doing a great job of this,” she tells him quietly, adding, “I don’t think I’ve told you yet.”

His lips part but only let air through, none of the words he’d like to say making their way through. For lack of anything better to do, he smiles, meaning it and going blurry right at the center with some incredible, blinding emotion that grips and shakes him. Beverly saves him from himself, luckily, and Alana appears to understand what he’s experiencing well enough not to need his words anyway.

“You’ll see if we can officially meet the guy sometime before he takes off again, right?” Beverly asks, sneaking another cookie from the plate Abigail left on the kitchen counter. Will looks and it’s one of the white chocolate macadamia nut cookies.

“Yeah, I’ll see how he feels about it,” he promises. “Do you want to take some of those for the road? Clarice might like ‘em.”

Beverly heads for the cupboard near the stove where she knows he keeps the Tupperware and winks at him. “Why do you think Abigail made oatmeal raisin?”

“Aww,” Alana coos wistfully.

Just then Abigail emerges from the hallway wearing a dress he hasn’t seen before. It’s knee-length, modest, of a floral pattern, and as parent-friendly as it is suitor-friendly, which makes his hackles bristle, just a bit.

Ever the poet he declares, “Oh.”

She blushes and instantly he feels horrible for saying anything, though he doesn’t apologize. He figures it’s his job—as a self-appointed parent-guardian-body guard to fluster and be flustered in turn. _This is what parents do,_ he tells himself, sweating in his loose plaid shirt with its unnecessarily long sleeves and stifling collar. It’s foreign—this kind of strangled pride intermingled with protective fear that stirs and lights in his chest, pinches in his throat.

Abigail says, “Beverly helped me pick it out.”

“Thank you, Beverly,” he blurts out, too abruptly.

Alana chokes on her laughter, and Beverly smiles widely at him before a laugh tumbles forth from that relaxed expression. “You leave her in my care to run off with your boyfriend. What did you think we were doing with all that bonding time? Playing Scrabble?”

Will scrubs his hand over his face and shakes his head. He can’t precisely name any of the jumbled feelings skyrocketing through him and cluttering his brain, but there’s gladness at the heart of it. He just smiles and can’t stop. No matter what kind of anxiety or uncertainty binds itself to this ledge, it doesn’t dull the brilliance of his happiness; it can’t. All he has to do is make the conscious decision to see that ledge as one small step before a seemingly endless but finite journey rather than a place where the earth ends and the depth of sky begins.

“You guys just be safe and have fun. I don’t want to see incriminating pictures on Facebook.”

Abigail scoffs, fondly rolling her eyes at his comment. “You want me to call you when I get to Marissa’s after?”

He nods once, gently answering with, “Yes, please.”

“Okay, I’ll see you tomorrow.” She comes forward a few paces and enfolds him in a hug that he’s careful not to sink into. “Bye, Will.”

“Bye. Tell Clarice and Marissa hi for me.”

Beverly lingers behind a moment, letting Alana and Abigail go ahead of her to the car. She waits for the front door to close behind them before turning to Will, all serious, kind eyes, to say, “You be safe tonight, too.”

“Okay, Beverly.”

“Baby steps.”

He sighs, a soft, equally patient sound. “I know. We’ll take it one day at a time.”

She grins. “Don’t burn the house down.”

“Yeah, yeah, get out of here.”

He waves his hand dismissively but goes out to the front yard with her, too curious about whether there’s a boy—or a girl, he amends—that’s merited the flowery dress that goes so well with Abigail’s soft pink scarf and bright blue eyes. After a few moments of vigorous battling with himself, he decides not to ask since if he did, Beverly would probably tell him. It’s not the kind of thing he’d want to learn that way, not just yet.

Once they’ve made it down the drive and waved back on their departure he heads back inside to feed the dogs and let them outside while he gets started on a fairly elaborate salad. He’s thought of grilling the steaks now and having them warm for when Hannibal comes home—to the house—to Will’s house, but he’d rather have them prepared on-the-spot rather than heated up. Hannibal always does everything so perfectly in the kitchen he wants dinner to be good—fantastic, in fact.

Okay, so he’s probably drastically overthinking his performance. Big deal.

It’s an understatement to say that he’s glad he’ll be seeing Hannibal in a few hours. He’s giddy, relieved, amazed, he’s…smitten, just a smitten fool for his rock star boyfriend who doubles as a master chef and has survived hell to become the man he is today.

Will gets breathless thinking about him, thinking about holding him close and whispering, _You’re home, you’re here, wherever you are is home._

It’s too soon, maybe, to say that—to say it _like that_. They’ve hedged around it, said bits and pieces that basically _mean_ what he has on his heart at present, but he wants to say it all without leaving anything out. He wants to say all of it. They’ve shared the bad and come to terms with the demons in sight. It’s enough for now, right now, but Will isn’t naïve enough to think Hannibal told him everything about the deaths of his parents, the man he called Grutas, his childhood _after_ Grutas…

Even Will’s own story, the retelling of his most recent scars, wasn’t entirely comprehensive. It hadn’t needed to be, nor does it need to be anytime in the very-near future. Will’s happy to wait if that’s what it takes for the full truth to come to him; he’s happy if it’s never his to know.

The fact is that Hannibal’s past is his own. If it hurts him too much or if it shames him, then Will won’t push. Will has been pushed before, and each time it happened, he turned on the person who did it. He’s been on both sides of it, and he won’t force Hannibal to make that call, not ever. As it is he’s returning from Lyon under unfortunate circumstances.

Hannibal hadn’t informed him of as much, but Mischa kept him updated on Bryn’s condition as she received the news. Will doesn’t know Bryn Fuller very well, but the few times they’ve spoken have been sufficient to win him over to her side. It bothers him that she’s hurt, to put it plainly. He doesn’t try to imagine what brand of angry guilt her injurious accident stokes in Hannibal. Will’s seen at the best of times how fiercely protective Hannibal can be, in neutral, pacified situations where he’s unprovoked but totally involved in what’s happening.

He’s seen how close Hannibal is with the band and how constant he is in guarding his sister like a human shield—how unrelentingly his love for her shows in his eyes whether she’s teasing him or smiling or standing still.

Actually Will’s dated people like Hannibal before. There’s no one recent and none of them were quite _like_ Hannibal so much as they were _similar_ to him. They presented with occasional flashes of intensity that Will liked immensely except the part where they never sustained themselves for long. He hesitates to admit it, but he loves Hannibal for his passion that doesn’t burn out, doesn’t dwindle the second his back is turned. That part of Hannibal that Mischa warned Will could be consumptive.

The adrenaline junkie in Will loves that uncertainty, the excitement that comes with it—and the complementary responsibility it demands of him. Hannibal’s curiosity surges and overflows and encourages; his knowledge and accrued wisdom presses against Will’s intelligence; the extent of his suffering traipses right up to Will’s publicized trauma and offers advice.

He’s remarkable. And as much as Will or anyone ever has the authority to say that he’s known someone with traits or eccentricities in common with Hannibal, no one else _is_ him. And Will doesn’t want to _know_ those people the way he’s _learning_ Hannibal Lecter, the tattooed, smoking saxophonist with his habit of claiming music for the two of them, together.

Will’s in this. He’s been in it since his beer bottle leapt to its demise off the bar table in La Fin Absolue du Monde and shattered into a million pieces. Much like that glittering glass, his walls had shuddered and cracked at the sound of Hannibal’s music. They’d jarred themselves open and hung at odd angles just to let those sweet, tortured sounds in, responding to him the way water does when weight plunges through its surface—splitting open where the new pieces go and rushing over the intrusion to keep it in place.

Hannibal does all of those things to him. He makes him feel unpredictable and aware of his breakability; he gives him a sense of strength and impenetrability while demonstrating every weakness in those thresholds; he shows him how powerful it can be to open up to another human being—how dangerously beautiful, breathtaking, and frightening.

Will’s made too much food by the time the hour comes for him to head out. He makes sure the dogs are all accounted for and then drives fifteen minutes to Washington Dulles International. There’s some rain but not much, and he’s half an hour early for Hannibal’s flight, which is on-schedule.

He walks around the first floor aimlessly for a while before going up the escalators to the more deserted of the two waiting areas. People are walking up here, but there’s no one really sitting, which means it’s noisy in the way he doesn’t mind and quiet in the way he prefers. He tries sitting but can’t keep still long enough to get comfortable and ends up pacing some more.

His favorite worrisome topic as of late creeps into the forefront of his mind: that of the revelation of Hannibal’s birthday. Leave it up to the universe to pick _that_ morning for Will to wake up in Hannibal’s bed.

Ever since Will found out about missing his birthday he’s been trying to think of ways to make up for it. He’d gone by Tobias’ shop in Baltimore upwards of half a dozen times looking for something to give him but never found anything meaningful enough. Tobias was intrigued with Will’s struggle to the point that he tolerated his indecisiveness, but in the end Will had given up trying to unearth a gift from his shop. At a loss he’d taken Alana window shopping last week for watches, cuff links…

Rings had not been on the table, not even minutely. He’d stayed away from them, heart swelling uncomfortably and beating unevenly in his chest when he thought too much about it. It would be nice to get Hannibal a ring—not for any possessive reason or to promise a certain vow that frankly scares the shit out of him, but to make a statement in between the two.

_I love you, stay with me, stay._

Not exactly a sacred oath, but a promise, heartfelt, given with every intention of seeing it through. Will means it. He means it so much his eyes sting and his throat closes up thinking about it.

It’s too soon. It has to be too soon.

But he checks the board with all the flight numbers on it and then looks again when he sees that no, actually, it’s right on time. Hannibal’s plane should be getting in any minute now, should be parking right outside the terminal and aligning with the off-ramp. It’s time. He’s home. He’s here. And Will’s waiting for him, standing stark still on his feet and only twitching his fingers in his pockets.

Some minutes tick by. Will considers going down to Baggage Claim so he can get Hannibal’s things more efficiently but realizes he doesn’t know how many bags Hannibal brought with him if any, and he thinks his luggage was black (helpful) but isn’t sure if it bore any discerning features.

In between two aborted ideas he gets to run down to Baggage Claim or sprint to his car and wait there, Will catches sight of a pair of feet stepping daintily onto the topmost platform of the escalator. It slinks upward and locks into place, and the figure standing atop it slowly edges into view. Will watches the pressed but loose pant legs climb up into a waistline and then higher to a torso, shoulders, a long neck stretched back, and the face he’s been waiting—sometimes impatiently—to see.

Hannibal’s eyes are closed at first, but when he opens them, it’s only a moment, maybe two, before he spots Will. It takes a moment to register, but Hannibal’s smile, when it comes, is beatific and exhaustedly relieved.

Will holds still until Hannibal reaches his level and then crosses to meet him halfway in a hug that Hannibal opens his arms wide to receive. Will closes his eyes and Hannibal buries his face in his neck for a good solid minute before sighing gently and letting go. He’s reluctant to relinquish his one moderately sized bag, but Will disarms him with a soft, slow kiss to say _hello, I missed you_ , which makes Hannibal charmingly easy to persuade.

Hannibal is uncharacteristically silent for the duration of the walk through the airport but Will allows it, squeezing Hannibal’s hand in his when Hannibal reaches for him at the revolving doors.

“Did you have a good trip?” Will asks once they get to the car. 

“I was unwell for part of the second flight,” he says after measuredly weighing his words.

“Oh, do you feel up for dinner? I haven’t cooked the steaks yet. They’ll keep in the freezer if you want to wait.”

“I think that would be better. I’m sorry, Will.”

“Hannibal.” Will closes the trunk of his Crown Victoria and walks around to Hannibal’s side where he’s leaned up against the door with faraway eyes. “You let me worry about dinner, okay? You’re always taking care of me. This week you don’t have to.”

Hannibal makes a valiant attempt at a whimsical scoff. It comes out sounding more like a yawn or a whine. Will steps cautiously into his space and slides his palm over Hannibal’s forehead. His skin is shiny, flushed. Maybe he hasn’t recovered from his bout of illness quite yet—was it motion sickness, a minor case of vertigo? He’s clammy to the touch. He might just need to sit still for a minute. In any case, it’s a short drive to the house and a slightly longer one to the nearest hospital.

“Do you need me to stop somewhere on the way home?”

For a few shaky seconds Hannibal continues to frighten Will with his mild catatonia, but upon hearing the question, he brightens. Parts of him come into focus and shiver into action, into cognizance. He parts his lips around a deep inhale, tucks his chin into his chest for the exhale, and reaches out blindly for Will’s shoulders with his neck relaxed and his head hanging forward. Will steps closer when Hannibal tugs and wraps his arms around him again, hands inching purposefully across his back and settling firmly behind his ribs.

Will whispers into Hannibal’s shoulder, “We can stay here as long as you want.”

“I don’t want to stay in this parking lot,” Hannibal says, making a clear effort to enunciate.

And Will smiles because he understands immediately. He tightens his hold around Hannibal once in a brief squeeze that brings their heartbeats and all their pulsing, vibrant biology neatly together. “But you want to stay _here_?”

“ _Yes,_ Will.”

Will rubs Hannibal’s back and whispers endearments and foggy promises into Hannibal’s hair for as long as it’s what Hannibal needs. When his shoulders drop and the tension in his back drains, Will risks leaning away to get a look at Hannibal’s face. His complexion’s gone sallow, and it can’t have been from a lack of sun in Europe.

“What can I do?”

Hannibal gives him a small smile that makes his cheeks look all the more sunken. “Take me home.”

“All right,” Will murmurs, getting hands in Hannibal’s hair and on his lapels and on the back of his neck. “All right.”

The drive is a calm one, the darkness of the approaching night boxing them into Will’s car and with each other. Hannibal takes his hand again, and Will drives the rest of the way with one hand on the steering wheel and one relaxed beneath Hannibal’s.

“Beverly and Alana took Abigail to a concert tonight. It’s Beverly’s cousin that I told you about.”

“Clarice Starling,” Hannibal names the girl—or woman, Will should say. She is, after all, Abigail’s senior by a few short years. “I listened to a handful of their songs. She has a lovely voice.”

Will beams at the road. “Yeah, once you get Beverly started on Clarice she could probably go on about that voice for hours.”

“You didn’t want to go?”

“I wanted to be with you.” Will squeezes his hand again. “Beverly said we could meet them there if you were feeling up to it, but I thought you’d want to rest, have a shower, eat.”

Hannibal looks out the window at the passing trees. Will swallows his questions and saves them for later when Hannibal’s acclimated to being on solid ground in a drastically different time zone. He picks a handful of safer ones that will have road-friendly answers and asks, “Do you want to see Abigail’s paintings? She just started experimenting with a new style.”

That gets Hannibal’s attention, thankfully, and he turns to give Will a dubious look. “Did she say I could look at them?”

“Yes,” Will says softly with a laugh. “Hannibal, she loved that brush set you got her from L’Eliografica. She barely even touches her other brushes anymore.”

For a few stalled seconds Hannibal just responds with pensive silence. Eventually he does say, “I would love to see her work.”

That’s their first stop once Will gets the car parked in the driveway on the side of his house. The dogs come to investigate Hannibal’s person while Will toes off his shoes and moves Hannibal’s bag into the hallway outside his room. He turns to ask, “Set you up in my room or the spare?”

“Yours for now, if that’s all right.”

Will hides his grateful sigh. “Yeah, that’s fine.”

He drops the bag off in the corner of his room and gestures toward Abigail’s room with its Spartan decoration and tidy bed. The bookshelf is perhaps the messiest visible aspect of her room as it houses the brush set Hannibal gave her, some clean canvases stacked in precarious piles, and predominantly orderly palettes with various color families splattered across them. Near the closet he can see the gray t-shirt she was wearing earlier today hanging out of the edge of the clothes’ hamper.

Hannibal makes his way organically to the bulletin board over Abigail’s bed with various prints pinned to it. There are maybe three dozen in neatly aligned rows, all by the same artist.

“Agnes Cecile,” Hannibal observes.

“Yeah, you know her work?”

Hannibal runs his thumb along the edge of one painting entirely done in shades of blue and inky black. The subject is a melancholic woman treading water captured in profile. He says, “Yes.”

“Abigail discovered her a few weeks back. She’s obsessed.”

“With good reason. She’s very talented. Mischa is fond of her art as well.”

Will navigates toward the easel behind the door and brings it to the foot of the bed where the light best illuminates it. Hannibal moves away from the collage on Abigail’s wall and stops in front of the canvas Abigail finished just last night. He leans in and tilts his head slowly to one side.

While he’s looking and losing himself in the brushstrokes Will quietly pads over to the hamper to tuck Abigail’s shirt inside. He straightens up and turns to catch Hannibal’s entertained smirk.

It’s not a blank stare. He’ll take it.

“This is lovely.”

Will smiles. He can’t not at the praise given for Abigail’s talent. “Can you tell what it is?”

“I see a face, perhaps a mask.”

“That’s the general consensus.”

“What did she intend?”

Will pockets his hands. “It’s her mom.”

Hannibal’s mouth opens around a quiet gasp, and he turns to look again at the canvas dressed in earth tones—warm browns and lively greens and blues that suggest an ocean sunrise. Will remembers that Louise’s eyes were that brilliant shade of cerulean—the cerulean that’s been utilized for the long tendrils of hair fanning around the woman’s face like a halo. Against the soothing tan backdrop that’s only just lighter than the subject’s complexion.

It’s abstract enough that it doesn’t look like Abigail’s mother at first glance, which was undoubtedly intentional. If the image of Louise Hobbs’ face hadn’t been burned into Will’s mind he might not recognize her either. Alana and Beverly hadn’t let on as if they knew who she was.

Hannibal seems to understand. He says, “Abigail loved her very much.”

“Yes, she did,” Will sighs.

They view the painting a while longer and then Will clears his throat. “Are you sure you’re not hungry?”

Hannibal turns his face toward Will but keeps his eyes on the painting, transfixed. “On second thought,” he says slowly, “I haven’t eaten since this morning. We could save the steaks for tomorrow and have the salad?”

Will smiles. “Yeah, sounds good. I’ll go take care of it.”

“Where are the towels?”

“In the hallway closet just across the hall.” Will moves the easel back to its spot behind the door and waits for Hannibal outside Abigail’s room. “Right here.”

“Thank you.”

Hannibal takes a quick enough shower that Will is still setting the table when he comes out, dressed down in ridiculously elegant matching pajamas, black with a white sash. It’s thin under Will’s hands when Hannibal walks right up to him and kisses him. It’s like he remembers out of nowhere that they’re on the same continent, in the same time zone, capable of having hair-ravaging, clothes-ruffling kisses that melts all of Will’s reserved calm.

“Do you feel better?” he mumbles into Hannibal’s chin.

In response, Hannibal gropes at his back, at his hips, claws at him through his shirt and his jeans. It’s not the right kind of desperation. Will’s worried where in a different situation he might be turned on. Hannibal backs him into the countertop hard enough to bruise the small of his back where he slams into the squared edge.

“Hannibal? Hey, what’s—just slow down.”

And Hannibal does slow down. He takes a step back, in fact, and perches his hands on either side of Will, fingers curled around the granite. His head drops solidly against Will’s shoulder, and he breathes. “I’m sorry. I don’t…I don’t know what I’m doing.”

The soft spoken admission alarms Will more than the display itself. He holds onto Hannibal’s arms, palms sliding smoothly up and down the silky sleeves. There’s a callus beneath his ring finger that drags on the material.

“Talk to me. What’s going on?”

Hannibal pulls away to address the table but stays close enough to touch. “I’ve only been thinking.”

Will’s stomach falls with dread. He dares to touch Hannibal’s cheek and nearly laughs his joy when Hannibal turns his head to kiss the palm of his hand. Hannibal still looks miserable, though, so he doesn’t smile. He can’t until he knows he’s done everything he can to rid Hannibal of that ugly feeling.

“Can I ask what about?”

Hannibal takes Will’s hands in his own and kisses them both. He stares at Will’s hands for a long time, considering, bargaining. Just as Will’s preparing to tell him he doesn’t have to tell him if he’s not ready, Hannibal shakes his head and sighs, saying, “I was reminded of something regrettable that I did, and it…I must have regressed.”

It’s a confusing expression, but Will turns it over in his mind while Hannibal gets his bearings and thinks he manages a suitable interpretation. Something set him back. The only thing Will can think of that would have Hannibal so rattled now is what was done to him when he was a child.

“I know now why I couldn’t remember meeting you in Washington,” Hannibal says softly.

Will’s body goes rigid before he can decipher the cause, but then it bleeds into him like pain leeches from a wound—something Bedelia had said to him about that night: _Don’t ask him to remember._

“Why?” Will asks as dread returns to weigh him down.

“I ran into someone that I once had…we were, of a sort…”

“You dated?”

“Something to that effect, I suppose.” Hannibal takes his hands away from Will’s and pulls out a chair, indicating for Will to sit, which he does. “It wasn’t a healthy relationship.”

They sit in silence for only a few seconds before Hannibal takes to serving their plates, shoveling salad onto a plate for Will and then onto another for himself. Will rises to get the door when one of the dogs scratches to go out. At the sound, the others come trotting through the kitchen to run out into the yard, all darkened and buzzing with insects. Will shuts the door and leaves them with silence after a quick satisfactory head count.

Hannibal hasn’t touched his food but has the fork in his hand and the rounded edge of his plate under two fingers. His eyes are trained on Will’s empty seat and then on Will once he returns to it.

“We met after you left.”

“Another lecturer, or a musician, like you?”

The look Hannibal gives him clearly says, _You are a musician, shut up_ , to which they both crack small smiles that are real but flicker out too soon.

“Neither, actually.” Hannibal pauses and his gaze drops to his plate before darting off to the wall. The hard line of Hannibal’s mouth tells Will what he’s trying to avoid—calling the man by name. “He was an art dealer then, when it suited him to be. We met at an exhibit of his friend’s. It was quite a long time ago now.”

Will eats, slowly, trying to gauge if it’s okay with Hannibal if he does. He isn’t bothered, but it takes about three bites into Will’s salad for Hannibal to decide he’s hungry, too.

“When we saw each other in Washington, Ma—” Hannibal clears his throat. “He was very rude.”

Hannibal takes a few more bites, appetite clearly kicking into gear, and Will offers wine. He brings back a red wine of the medium-bodied variety. The salad is mild enough on its own that a fruitier pairing won’t completely overwhelm it. Hannibal glances at the label as Will pours. The corners of his lips twitch with the faintest hints of a smile.

A few sips and many bites later with Hannibal’s glass half-drained and much of Will’s plate consumed, Will mumbles, “I wish I’d been there.”

“Why?” Hannibal asks in such a way that Will alerts to his mistake before Hannibal even says, “So you could walk away?”

“That’s…”

“Not fair,” Hannibal supplies apologetically. “I’m sorry.”

Will catches his eyes for just a second and then nods once. “It’s okay.”

Hannibal pokes at a crunchy piece of lettuce and eats it, chewing slowly with a lackluster glaze in his eyes. He swallows and says, “I struck him.”

“Who? The ex?”

“Yes,” Hannibal says flatly, setting his fork down on his half-eaten plate. “Donald and Bryn were there when he approached me. They didn’t want me to speak to him. He could be…indecent, uncaring. Often malicious. And he loved to make a scene.”

“Did he hurt you?” Will asks uncertainly, a poorly delivered question as it has multiple meanings, all of which Hannibal interprets.

“That night?”

“Or any night.”

“In a general sense, perhaps. I hadn’t made myself available to him in such a capacity that he _should_ have been able to hurt me, but that night was different. I gave him the power to make it different.”

Will bites his lip and stands to clear their plates. Hannibal lets him and helps himself to the bottle of Shiraz left standing forlornly on the table. Will washes the dishes and Hannibal drinks.

Half a glass and two cleaned plates later Hannibal leans against the counter beside Will, their hips lined up solid and warm. There’s no intention there but to be close. Hannibal’s stance is almost repentant, as if he means to communicate with his body, _I’m sorry I was rough with you._

It necessitates an answer, so Will leans back, bumping Hannibal’s shoulder with his and locking eyes with him to say back, _You’re okay. We’re okay._

“He said the most extraordinary things, in front of Bryn and Donald, and his friends that had come with them. I didn’t know what to do. It was the first time I’d felt so humiliated in—in _years_. He got under my skin, and…”

Hannibal looks away, runs a hand through his hair. Will sets the dripping dishes down in the sink, moving slowly to turn the water off. He sees the tremor going through Hannibal’s hand, his fingers trembling. The muscle in his jaw is tense with worry, agitation. Shame?

“I _don’t_ …that was the only time I’ve ever…raised my hand to someone that I—”

“Hannibal,” Will breathes, mostly to himself. “Hann, look at me.”

He does, but his eyes don’t make it up past Will’s collar. Will touches him with wet hands, one planted firmly on his shoulder and the other threading fingers into his hair. 

Again he says, softly, “Look at me. I don’t think less of you because you got into a fistfight once with a guy who used to treat you like shit.”

“I didn’t say he—”

“Did he?” Will asks gently with one raised eyebrow.

Hannibal sighs and skirts the question to assert that, “It wasn’t a fistfight.”

“So you threw one punch four years ago.” Will tries for a light shrug. The tension goes out of Hannibal’s body, but he still looks unsure, untrusting of his willingness to let it go. “It’s okay.”

“No, it isn’t,” Hannibal insists, obviously restraining himself but being overly gentle as he shakes Will’s hands off him and moves away. “It’s _not_.”

“ _Why_ not?”

Hannibal half-yells, “Because I—” His eyes widen a fraction, and he drops into the nearest chair. He drops his head into his hands and sighs shakily. “I don’t want to _be_ like…”

_I must have regressed._

Will kneels at Hannibal’s side, gathering Hannibal’s hands in his because he wants him to believe that he trusts them, that they’re safe and good to hold in his own and because he’s astonished Hannibal could think anything different.

“You’re not,” he says clearly and with a calm air of assurance that thankfully doesn’t evidence the quiet anger welling up in his chest for those who hurt Hannibal before he ever had a say in it. “You’re not like them, Hannibal. You’re not like any of them.”

“How would you know what I’m like,” Hannibal mumbles weakly but with enough conviction that Will feels his resolve shudder once before strengthening beyond what he even knew himself capable of.

He rocks forward onto his knees and takes hold of both sides of Hannibal’s face so that he must look at him because that’s the only way he will believe what Will says next.

“I love you.”

Hannibal’s bottom lip quivers, but he only blinks and remains silent, sensing correctly that there is more for him to hear.

“I know what you’re like because I know how you were hurt. I know that there’s more to it than just what you’ve told me, and maybe there’s so much more that I’ll never know the extent of what was done to you.” Will makes himself slow down. “I know that you are an intense, brilliant human being and that loving you and being loved by you is like standing over a fire.

“And for all your justified rage, you are one of the most compassionate, gentle people that I know, and anyone who makes you feel less than what you are can deal with me.”

Very quickly it seeps in that he’s just said a lot of very potentially volatile things that Hannibal might not want from him, but before he can worry about it in earnest Hannibal is throwing his arms around his neck. He blinks wet eyelashes against his neck and holds onto him tightly, taking short, fast breaths and trying to be quiet about it. Will nearly falls over but helps Hannibal slink off the chair and onto the floor with him so that they rock back and forth in a jumbled, intimate heap.

“I hope you believe me,” Will whispers after a while, when Hannibal’s breathing has calmed down and the heartbeat pounding against his has slowed to a normal pace.

“I do,” Hannibal croaks, pausing to clear his throat and sit up straight. He drags the back of his hand across his tear-tracked face, leaving red streaks of flushed skin in his wake. “I do believe you, Will, and…and I…”

Will helps him to his feet, guessing that maybe Hannibal feels vulnerable on the floor. He thinks he’s probably right, considering the kiss he gets once they’re both standing. When Hannibal pulls away he looks embarrassed but steadfastly confident.

“I love you.”

Will allows himself to grin and takes a kiss of his own off those swollen, finally relaxed lips. “I’ve been trying to tell you,” he risks joking, laughing when Hannibal teasingly pinches him.

“Let me help with the remaining dishes.”

“You wash; I’ll dry?” Will offers.

Hannibal nods yes, and they get to it. Will is wiping down the last wine glass when Hannibal turns to dry his hands on the towel hanging over the oven handle. He comes back and drapes his front all along Will’s back, hands settling on both sides of his ribcage and pressing. Will tilts his head so Hannibal can kiss his neck, and it feels _right_ , like soothing a burn with aloe.

“I’m sorry I ruined our first night in this house together,” he murmurs.

Will contorts himself a bit and manages to bite Hannibal’s ear. “No.”

“No?” Hannibal parrots, though his lips are parted in a surprised smile.

“No,” Will repeats firmly, turning in Hannibal’s arms so he can wind his around Hannibal’s neck. Gentler he says, “No, I don’t accept that.”

Hannibal’s smile softens and his eyes half-close. He leans in slowly and presses his forehead to Will’s and breathes. “Thank you.”

“But just for the record I make awesome steak, and you’re missing out.”

“It’s late for a steak dinner,” Hannibal counters. The sly implication underlying his observation makes Will’s skin prickle delightedly, but he girds himself—makes himself wait.

“There is something I’ve been wanting to do,” he confesses, “for when I got you back in my arms.”

Interest, curiosity, and blunt desire manifest on Hannibal’s face. “What’s that?”

Will bites his lip and takes Hannibal’s hand in his. “Come with me.”

It makes his heart do funny acrobatic things behind his ribs that Hannibal follows him immediately, unquestioningly into the living room where Will has a CD waiting in the stereo for just this moment. Hannibal lingers back by the coffee table, ready to dive into whatever Will wants but probably not expecting the quaintly lilting music that fills the room. The look on his face when he recognizes the song nearly breaks Will’s heart, but he holds his hand out anyway, terrified and panicked but needing this because Hannibal needs it, too.

_“Now I don’t hardly know her, but I think I could love her.”_

“May I,” he asks, voice trembling in time with the shivering sustained chords, “have this dance?”

Hannibal’s mouth drops open as Tommy James sings, _“Well, if she come walking over…”_

He takes a few off-balance steps, forcing one foot in front of the other until he can join one hand with Will’s and weave the other around his back. _“Now I’ve been waiting to show her.”_

They sway a few times with the music and giggle like children when the beat changes on them. It flings them into a quicker tempo that Hannibal uses to spin him out and then back into his arms. He knows the song, or he couldn’t time it so perfectly. 

_“Yeah, my mind’s such a sweet thing. I want to do everything. What a beautiful feeling. Crimson and clover, over and over.”_

Hannibal drops his hand from Will’s to hold him around the small of his back. Will lifts both of his to Hannibal’s shoulders. Will follows his lead, leaning and swooning to wah wah and vocalization and closing his eyes against Hannibal’s hair when the music lets him drop his guard. Hannibal nuzzles Will’s hair, out of sight but present, close enough that Will can feel his grin. He worries extensively about stepping on Hannibal's bare feet, but his socked toes only ever graze Hannibal’s and only with intention. Hannibal makes him lighter on his feet than he’s ever been with another dance partner. It makes his insides jittery and slow at the same time, how it must feel to glow from the inside out.

_“Crimson and clover, over and over.”_

Will feels fit to sleep by the time the song ends, forehead pressed up against Hannibal’s temple and barely moving when the music fades entirely. Hannibal takes a breath like he means to speak, but the next song queued to play begins: another slow piece by The Rolling Stones.

“Is this a mix CD?” he asks distractedly.

“Yeah,” Will sighs, humming contentedly, sleepily into Hannibal’s cheek.

Hannibal hums, too, troublingly awake and alert. Will leans back to look at him and chagrined, admits, “I’ve been putting a lot of thought into this.”

“Will?”

“Hmm?”

Hannibal bunches his fingers against Will’s back, crawling higher near his ribs and drawing shapeless lines while the stereo croons, _“Wild, wild horses couldn’t drag me away.”_

“What else can I say to you?” he murmurs helplessly, though a brilliant smile has stretched over his mouth. He touches Will’s cheek, his jaw, his chin. “What else is left?”

Will blinks around surprise tears, a breathless laugh dying on his lips. He asks, heart pounding, “What else?”

_“No sweeping exits or off-stage lines could make me feel bitter or treat you unkind.”_

Hannibal shakes his head, rushing forward to brush noses with him. He breathes, sounding winded, “I’m so happy when I’m with you.”

“Good,” Will laughs, kissing Hannibal and tumbling onto the couch with him.

_“Wild horses, we’ll ride them someday…”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “nell’acqua” by Agnes Cecile  
> http://agnes-cecile.deviantart.com/art/nell-acqua-204488655
> 
> Yering Station Shiraz Viognier, 2010  
> http://www.wine.com/v6/Yering-Station-Shiraz-Viognier-2010/wine/127471/Detail.aspx
> 
> “Wild Horses” by The Rolling Stones
> 
> “Crimson and Clover” by Tommy James and the Shondells


	24. Cool, Calm, & Collected

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s a good night for everyone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _She seems to glow brilliantly white / And her hair seems to shine in the night / With her feet unbelievably light / And her teeth ready, sharpened to bite_

Inside the darkened venue there’s a pretty sizeable crowd—intimidating by her own standards but perhaps exhilarating to someone accustomed to so many people’s eyes at once. Clarice is comfortable with it, she knows. They spoke of it briefly after Beverly brought them back from Shenandoah to Will’s for dinner. Performance puts the same light in her eyes that music does for Will and that art does for Mischa.

Two other bands play before them, and the night itself has a very distinct open-mic feel to it. Abigail likes the music, even if it’s not her medium the way it is in certain other people’s lives.

She hadn’t known that Beverly played so many instruments, for example. Of course Abigail had known that Beverly and Will worked together and sometimes covered for each other, but she hadn’t sat down to think about what sort of skills Beverly had of her own. She’d taken for granted that Will was the only one with a gift for all things that could sing a tune one way or another. And maybe, truthfully, he _was_ the only one with an inborn _gift_ for it, but to hear Beverly play the piano.

Man, oh, man.

It had only gotten that much better when Clarice sat next to her on the bench and melted easily into song, forming natural lyrics in a language Abigail couldn’t follow but that made her stomach flutter and her heart race. She hadn’t been the only one; when she looked at Will, she thought he might have had goose bumps. 

It’s no different when her band comes up near the end of the show, stage lights illuminating the three of them in their simple, unassuming attire and wide smiles that make up for any lost fashion points. They’ve got someone on drums further back on the stage—could be a regular band member or someone who works at the club. Abigail doesn’t know him, though.

The music kicks up, and it’s too good and too freeing not to just _move_ with it, so she does, dancing in place and spinning around when Alana holds her hand out. Marissa laughs and dances with them, and it’s wonderful because Abigail can’t even remember the last time she _let go_ enough to do anything but paint. It hadn’t even been until very recently that she allowed herself to open up enough to do even _that_ honestly, unflinchingly.

But this is different. It’s unchained, and it’s for her and for no one, and anybody can have it if they choose to participate. 

At some break in the lyrics she hears one of the singers onstage laughing into the microphone. It might be Clarice, but they’re all harmonizing in the next second and she can’t tell. The trio’s penultimate song is a lilting Korean tune that has Abigail swaying and Marissa calmly smiling. Abigail might deny the blinding truth of it, but the songs that swept her away swept something darker and more suffocating with her kicking feet and rolling shoulders. 

It feels a bit like home how solid it is—how much it lets her feel without forcing her to feel too much. She wonders if there’s a way to thank Clarice for that; if she should be thankful to the band instead of Clarice only but reasons that of course she’d favor her friend over the whole. Wouldn’t that just be the usual response? Obviously she’s thrilled for the band because that ultimately means being thrilled for Clarice and about her success doing something she loves that isn’t particularly easy to excel at.

All right, fine, so she also looks adorable in denim, and Abigail’s wearing a cute dress to the show on _purpose_. Whatever. Big deal.

Okay, big deal; semi-frightening, what-you-lost-me-at-denim, big deal.

Probably not in a bad way, though. It’s not as if she’s currently surrounded by people who would ostracize and ridicule her for something she’d only halfway made up her mind about.

Doesn’t matter. Decidedly not that big of a deal. Nope, not at all.

They head backstage after the show, and Beverly introduces them to Molly and Hei Ryung. Molly is their guitarist and occasional wielder of a ukulele that she plays like nobody’s business, and Hei Ryung alternates with Clarice as lead and backing vocals. With permission from the owner of the establishment they linger in the parking lot about an hour after the place clears out and sit in the back of Beverly’s Jeep eating cookies and laughing.

Alana is currently engaged in what looks like a very deep conversation with Hei Ryung and Clarice about the academic side of music theory and what goes into teaching the stuff in schools. Beverly in the meantime holds up a conversation with Molly and Marissa about the perks of being friends with a guy who’s dating a rock star, which is extremely entertaining and slightly mortifying but mostly eavesdropping material. The act itself is facilitated by Abigail’s current spot of quiet on the edge of the lowered truck bed with a quilt thrown over her legs and her pink scarf stifling her neck.

Abigail overhears Molly saying, “Pics, or it didn’t happen.”

And then over her own sputtering laugh she can make out the electronic tapping of Beverly’s phone keyboard. She fiddles with it for a second, and Abigail looks over when she shows it.

Molly whistles. “Fisherman’s got it going _on_.”

Abigail can’t help that she chokes on her cookie and then nearly dies again laughing.

“What!” Molly shouts, mock-affronted and grinning with her whole face. “He’s _cute_.”

“She has a point, though,” Alana concedes over her shoulder, catching the tail-end of the conversation. “I don’t think I know of another grown man that I could call cute.”

Beverly opens her mouth, at first wearing a serious expression on her face but then faltering. “You’re right.”

They dissolve into some more laughter then, and Abigail sinks back into her quiet corner to enjoy the known anonymity of the night—being out here with people and not having to work so hard to be herself in the midst of everyone else taking the chore out of it. It’s not a performance to sit back and observe, to listen, to smile softly when something is funny or endearing or too surprising for any other reaction to be plausible.

A quiet voice says, “Beverly told me you made these?”

Abigail turns her head, back still leaned in a lazy arch against the wall of the Jeep behind her. Clarice is there, wrapped up in her denim jacket and a skirt that brushes the tops of her knees. More importantly, she’s smiling.

“Hmm? Oh, yeah. I did. I made them.”

Abigail leaves her face in the neutral mask that it’s been for most of the night outside of when the music took her pain and lulled her into respite. The giddy rising feeling in her chest isn’t enough to push her to smile, so she doesn’t push it—doesn’t want to push it. Clarice won’t pity her if she doesn’t smile all the time; on the contrary, she might pity Abigail if she _did_. More’s the irony.

“They’re delicious.” Another smile, a smaller one.

“She said you like oatmeal raisin,” Abigail confesses, dropping her eyes briefly and fumbling with the blanket covering her legs and making her scratchy and too hot. She bunches it up and sets it aside. 

“I like your dress, too. It’s pretty.”

_Abort, abort, abort, abort!_

“Thanks,” Abigail _squeaks_ , _**no**_. “Um, you played really well tonight. All of you. You’re a talented group.”

“Thank you,” Clarice says in a soft, reverent voice that suggests true humility rather than rehearsed gratitude. “I’m happy you could all come and see us. Sometimes Beverly has to work, and I see Alana half as much.” She looks away for a moment, smiling. “Marissa and Molly were fast friends.”

Abigail follows Clarice’s line of vision and sure enough, Marissa is in the works of finishing Molly’s sentence—saying something that pitches them both into peals of shrieking laughter that has Beverly covering her face with one hand and slowly shaking her head.

“I can only imagine what they’re capable of together.”

Clarice climbs up onto the truck bed to sit next to Abigail then, neither too close nor too far away. For a moment they both just look out across the empty parking lot and up the wide streets sometimes flashing with headlights. They’re calm, individually, and it’s pleasant. It’s _so_ pleasant.

“How old were you when you learned that you could sing?” Abigail asks a bit distantly, mutedly.

“I remember being seven years old, singing a song by the Kim Sisters.” Clarice nods slowly, eyes looking back into a past not so far away but wholly removed from where they find themselves now. “My mother was the only one who ever heard me for a long time. When did you learn you could paint?”

Abigail picks at the neatly stitched ends of her scarf and looks down through her blush. “Just this year. It started out as an experiment, and I ended up being kind of good at it.”

Clarice nudges her gently with an elbow. “Oh, come on. I saw that half-finished piece you had in your room.”

“It was half-finished,” Abigail repeats, grasping at modesty. “It’s done now.”

“I’d like to see it sometime, if that’s okay.”

“Yeah,” Abigail says, probably too quickly. She winces, but Clarice just bites her lip around an airy chuckle that makes Abigail’s chest go all fluttery. “Whenever you want.”

They decide that the upcoming Friday will work as well as anything else, and Abigail can cook dinner that night if need be. She’ll have to see what Will wants to do, but he’s let her entertain guests at the house without him before. Failing that, she thinks Hannibal would like to meet Clarice. She has a quiet but observant disposition to her that would do funny things when squared off against Hannibal’s similar temperament.

After taking an obligatory selfie with the seven of them crammed into the space of Beverly’s Jeep, they say their goodbyes. It takes quite a while to do both of these things, but it isn’t a drag getting through it. Clarice hugs Abigail tightly before they part ways to pile into their separate cars: Clarice with Molly and Hei Ryung, Abigail with Marissa, and Alana with Beverly.

On the ride back to Marissa’s, some questions drift into her mind in a subconscious sort of way. It’s probably a long shot asking whether Clarice has any idea of what happened to her. 

Will had his moment of terrible doubt with Hannibal when that story about him resurfaced on the internet right next to a picture of him and Hannibal together. Even if she hadn’t heard about it, she’d have questions, wouldn’t she? It’s normal to be curious about things that seem unusual, and Clarice would be curious about Will, wouldn’t she? She’d want to know why Abigail lives with him when he’s not…

When he’s not what? Not her family? Not her father?

In the beginning she would have screamed those things _at_ him in some misplaced, confused rage, but she isn’t too proud to admit that the reality has shifted. They’ve changed; they’ve come to an in-between that cancels out their mutual loneliness and regret with companionship.

Who is he if not her only surviving family? Who is he if not the only person left in the world who wants to be and _has_ been a father to her since every horrible thing had so nearly destroyed her life?

They’re rhetorical questions. Sometimes the only way she can even think to answer them is, _He’s Will._

And the same goes for Marissa, Beverly, Alana, Hannibal, and Mischa. They are who they are, and if they fill specific roles in her life, then that’s that. It feels too soon to start rebuilding that part of her life—too dangerously close to replacement when it can’t ever be that, even when it feels like that’s the only thing that will make it somewhat bearable.

The point is Clarice most likely knows what Abigail has been through this past year. She has to have an idea of what’s been taken from her and of the stories that continue to follow her everywhere she goes.

She feels safe in it, though. It’s odd to have that thought and the resounding clarity that comes with it, but there it is, not going anywhere soon. If Marissa picks up on this internal struggle—and Abigail’s positive she _has_ —she doesn’t ask. She’s great at anticipating the sore topics versus the safe ones, and Abigail’s always appreciated her knack for timing.

Well, maybe less so when Marissa’s chosen alternative subject is Will and Hannibal. Marissa keeps her up late asking about the latter. It’s mostly mundane stuff like how old he is, what he does, how the two of them met. Or it’s mundane to Abigail, at least, since it’s all common knowledge by now. She lays down the law right quick, telling her, “His only sibling is a woman, and while I don’t think she’s currently seeing anybody, I’d suggest you don’t get any ideas.”

“There’s no harm in asking,” Marissa defends, smiling and tossing a Cheerio up into the air that she catches expertly in her mouth. “He’s hot, though, in that older-guy, too-handsome-to-be-good-looking sort of way.”

Abigail snorts and jostles Marissa’s arm when she starts to toss up another Cheerio. The errant hoop of grain goes bouncing off the leg of the couch.

“Speaking of oddly attractive people,” Marissa prompts, unbothered at the lost morsel. Her eyes have that glint to them that usually means trouble for Abigail.

It would appear the other shoe has dropped at last. “Um?”

“Clarice, duh,” she teases, grinning outright and about two seconds away from vibrating up off the floor and into the ceiling. “She’s _cute_.”

“Yeah?” Abigail stammers, face warming. “I didn’t notice.”

“So you just happened to bake cookies that she loves.” It’s spoken accusingly but with an undercurrent of fondness and exasperation. “Which, by the way, were spectacular. Nice work. New recipe?”

“Beverly told me ahead of time what she likes,” she snaps, an incessant blush still creeping up the side of her neck. “And Will started buying a different kind of butter. I don’t know.”

Marissa just smirks down at her half-eaten box of cereal. Abigail seizes the opportunity to change the subject. “Elise said you could go get the kitten tomorrow?”

“Yep, still wanna come with me to the pet store? I bought the wrong kind of litter.”

Abigail looks at the lonely litter box sitting outside the bathroom. “Sure. You’re not going to keep it there in the hallway, are you?”

“It’ll probably go over…” She leans back against the couch and points toward the bedroom. “In there somewhere—probably just outside the closet, near the window. Like that’ll help.” She shrugs. “Do you know if Lecter’s sister is still planning on adopting the other two?”

“As far as I know.” Abigail stands and takes the small plate at her knee into the kitchen. “Will seems to think he can get Hannibal to take one of them.”

“Can you imagine that guy keeping a cat?” Marissa snorts like the image amuses her, though Abigail can’t see her face from her spot at the sink. “And anyway, how would that work with Will’s twelve dogs?”

“Seven,” Abigail corrects her.

Marissa says, “Seven dogs.”

“If they lived at Will’s it could work.” Abigail quickly washes the plate and stacks it to dry on the mostly barren rack atop the counter. She shakes water droplets off her fingers and comes back into the small living room. “The dogs are pretty good about other animals, once they get familiarized. They’re just like people.”

“I’d still pay money to see it,” Marissa teases, strolling into the kitchen to tuck the cereal box back into place atop the refrigerator.

“Have you thought about names for the tabby?”

“Hmm, something rough,” she says with an amused laugh. “Did you see her wrestling with the black kitten? She’s got teeny tiny guns.”

“I did see.” Abigail leans against the counter and thinks about the kittens’ mother. “Too bad Charlie wasn’t having any of their roughhousing. I think Mischa’s kitten was about to school yours.”

“Oh, sure.” Marissa smirks. “Speaking of parents, weren’t you supposed to call Will at some point?”

“Ah,” Abigail starts to say and then pats down her pockets for her phone. While jogging into the next room she mutters, “He might have gone to bed already.”

Marissa snorts. “Yeah. That’s what he’d be doing right now.”

“You shut it.”

Abigail finds her phone, presses 1, and waits.

\--

“Is that your phone ringing?”

“Huh?”

Will blinks his eyes open and rubs the back of his wrist over his forehead. Hannibal shifts behind him, wrapping his arms more tightly around him and drawing up his knees so he boxes Will in more fully. The cooling water sloshes in the bathtub around them and Will sniffles, disoriented.

“I think your phone is ringing in the next room.”

Hannibal helps him sit up straighter and stays quiet while he listens for the telltale ringtone that means Abigail is calling him. He starts moving. “Oh, it is.”

“Let me,” Hannibal coos into his ear, giving Will a gentle push so he can stand. 

Will drapes his arms over the side of the tub and watches Hannibal’s movements, all lazy and relaxed but shot through with control. He rests his cheek on his arm and waits for Hannibal to wrap a towel around his waist and leave the room before likewise extracting himself from the water. Abigail is probably just checking in, but he doesn’t want to be naked in the bath while talking to her—especially not if Hannibal is going to be in the room, which he most likely will be.

He unstops the drain and gets his bathrobe loosely slung about his shoulders. When Hannibal comes back, he’s talking on the phone. Will ruffles his wet hair with a smaller towel and sits on the edge of the bathtub until Hannibal comes through the door again.

“—not a clumsy dancer at all,” he’s saying, winking at Will as he pushes the door gently closed behind him. “I was almost disappointed.”

Will blushes, in response to the steam and to Hannibal’s state of undress and to their apparent gossiping. He holds his hand out for the phone, but Hannibal leans his hip against the sink and scratches his stubble with his free hand. He bites his lip and laughs heartily at something Abigail says, and Will hangs his head, blushing harder for not knowing what they’re talking about.

“He’s growing agitated, gėlyte,” Hannibal murmurs, sounding far too amused. “I’ll have to give him the phone now.”

There’s a pause, and then he says, “Yes, you, too. Hmm? It means flower. Did I call you that?” Will looks up at his small embarrassed laugh. “Forgive me. I talk that way with my sister. Yes, she’s fine. Oh, were you? That will make her very happy.”

Will tries to heave a sigh but ends up laughing as he pushes himself onto his feet. “Maybe you just hang onto the phone then.”

Hannibal does hang onto it and follows Will out of the bathroom, switching the light off as he goes. He says to Abigail, “No, but I heard about it. Will said we might have another opportunity to see them play?”

Will roots around in his drawers, half-listening, and tosses a clean night shirt and some boxers onto the bed. Hannibal hangs back by the bathroom door nonchalantly securing his towel in place with one hand and chattering on pleasantly with Abigail. Will follows along enough to hear them discuss Bryn’s injury, the kittens, baby Barney, and Clarice. Like he anticipated, Hannibal perks up at the mention of Beverly’s cousin.

“I hope we will see them before I leave. They sound wonderful.”

There’s another brief pause. “Yes, would you like to speak with him before you go?”

Will pulls on his boxers and leaves the bathrobe on as Hannibal brings him the phone and then promptly seeks out his suitcase. Entertained, he says, “Hey.”

“Hi, Will. Sorry I didn’t call sooner. We were out late, and then I just forgot once we got in.”

“That’s all right. How was the show?”

“It was good! The crowd was great, the music was awesome, and everybody liked my cookies.”

He smiles at her enthusiasm. “I’m glad you had fun.”

“Sounds like _you_ had fun, too,” she teases lightly.

Will sputters when he hears Marissa exclaim, “I _knew_ it!”

After an awkward beat of silence, she says, away from the phone, “They were _dancing,_ you _perv_!”

Hannibal very aptly chooses that moment to drop his towel and get dressed for bed. Will clears his throat. “Okay, on that note, we’re calling it a night over here.”

“Sorry.” She sounds every bit as mortified as he feels. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“Yeah, um, I’ll be home in the evening. Rehearsal starts pretty early, so I won’t see you if you come by in the morning. Hannibal’s probably going to be here. Are you okay with that?”

“Sure, but Marissa’s bringing her kitten home tomorrow. I might stay a while.”

“That’s fine. Are you going to be home for dinner? He wants to make something.”

He’d named some specific dish that Will remembered at the time but forgot ten minutes after the fact. Hannibal sits beside him, dressed exquisitely in his same silky pajamas from before. Will turns to him and says, “Roulades?”

“Rouladen Hausfrauenart.”

“Rouladen Hausfrauenart,” he parrots back to Abigail who chuckles at him—or them, maybe.

“I’ll be home.”

“Okay, then we’ll see you. Good night, Abigail.”

“Night.”

Will hangs up and tosses his phone further up the bed near the pillows. Hannibal remains silent while he does, just patiently waiting for something to happen. Will studies him in his slightly wrinkled shirt and pajama bottoms. He’d needed convincing to take them off and then put them back on when Will suggested they draw a—very platonic, thank you very much, Marissa—bath. 

“Do all of your pajamas look like that?”

Hannibal tugs on the collar of his shirt and shrugs. “Yes, come to think of it.”

Will touches his own shirt: cotton, comfortable, practical. He smirks. “How often do you fantasize about updating my wardrobe?”

“ _Oh_ ,” Hannibal says. Will barks a laugh at the look on his face. “Frequently.”

“That bad, huh?”

“Don’t misunderstand me,” he adds quickly. “I like you in anything, or nothing, as it were. That may be my favorite look on you.”

Will shakes his head, looking down to hide his grin as he scoots back toward the pillows. “Uh huh.”

“But you would look divine in a well-tailored suit.”

“Guess I’ll have to wear one for the concert in January,” Will mentions off-handedly like this particular topic hasn’t been stressing him out for a full week now.

There’s some time left to figure out the logistics in earnest, but he’s been strangely worried about what suit to get for the occasion. He wants to make a good impression for his debut on this side of the music scene. His lectures and conference talks had always been given in rebelliously casual attire with very little pomp or circumstance to them, but he doesn’t want that attitude to follow him into this particular spotlight.

He _wants_ to be great, and he wants to look the part because he knows already that he _is._

“I could give you the information for my personal tailor.”

“Because you have a personal tailor,” Will yawns, lying back.

Hannibal crawls up next to him and props himself up on one elbow. “I do, yes. It would make it easier on you to use her. This situation appears to make you uncomfortable.”

“It does make me uncomfortable.”

“Why is that?”

“Because,” Will sighs, covering his face with his arm. “It’s not like it says anything about me apart from, ‘Look at this nice thing I could afford to buy.’”

Hannibal’s smiling softly at him when he tugs Will’s arm away from his face. “It says you care enough about what you do that you’ll respect the conventions structured around it.”

Will takes a long breath in and lets it out slowly, reaching up to tuck a matted lock of hair behind Hannibal’s ear. His eyes stay on Will’s, even as he lowers down to lie flat on his chest. Their heartbeats skip on different beats. Quietly he confesses, “I care about it a lot, Hannibal.”

“I know you do,” Hannibal whispers back. “That’s why you’re going to be amazing.”

“Is that the only reason?” Will drawls back, but there’s a small smile tugging at his lips.

Hannibal scoffs at him but presses up on his elbows to kiss him for five long seconds and then for twice as long. The third time he kisses him, Will loses track of the seconds that tick by. He supposes life is like that when things are good.

“You weren’t really disappointed that I didn’t fall on my face earlier, were you?”

“Only a little,” Hannibal murmurs, the corners of his lips twitching against Will’s cheek. “I would have liked to catch you.”

“You got to hold me,” Will protests. “ _And_ you got to lead. Greedy.”

“Would you have preferred to lead?” Hannibal asks innocently, a chord of mischief in his voice that Will enjoys more than he should.

Will just hums noncommittally, weaving his fingers into Hannibal’s drying hair and scratching down the nape of his neck. He tries to replicate that tone that so neatly suggests innuendo and ends up sounding breathless when he says, “Only when you want me to lead.”

He nails it, though, because Hannibal’s eyes go hooded and he kisses him hard on the mouth. When he pulls away they’re both breathless and holding on.

“That only applies to dancing,” Will gasps out, dropping his head back against the pillow when Hannibal moves down to kiss his neck. “And sex,” he groans, tilting his chin up and to the right.

“I can respect that,” Hannibal murmurs, sounding unfairly coherent. Will tugs on his arm until Hannibal takes the hint and climbs on top of him. More amused than anything, he muses, “Really, Will?”

“I love ruffling your feathers when you look like this.”

That admission gets a laugh out of him. “When I look like what?”

“So…” Will tugs on fistfuls of Hannibal’s crumpled nightshirt. “Put _together_.”

Hannibal nuzzles his neck like that’s the sweetest thing he’s ever heard, shoulders shaking with silent laughter that makes Will laugh, too, in spite of what he’s trying to accomplish. He lets Hannibal roll them over so that he’s situated on top and folds his hands contentedly over Hannibal’s sternum.

His teeth catch the light when he shows them in his smile, and Will just stares and beams and grins because he can’t help it. He loves Hannibal’s prominent cheekbones, his angular teeth, his fair eyebrows, and the diagonal line his body makes from the slope of his neck to the curved end of his shoulder.

Will says, “Thank you.”

Hannibal blinks, smile softening but staying in place even as his eyebrows twitch once in confusion. “For what?”

He bends his neck to kiss Hannibal’s collarbone through his shirt. “For the tailor. For believing in me.”

Fingers move through his hair and massage his scalp. Hannibal hums once. “I had prefer to dress you myself, to be honest.”

Will snorts and buries his face in that soft, crinkled shirt. “I’m sorry I can’t sleep in tomorrow.”

“You’re here now. We’re both here.”

He sighs. “Should probably try to sleep.”

“I’ll make us breakfast in the morning.”

“Mmm.”

“Good night, Will.”

He smiles. “Good night, gėlyte.”

The vibration of Hannibal’s laugh against his cheek and heart are the last thing Will remembers before falling asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Clarice’s trio is based on the Barberettes  
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8vvpczEhSk


	25. Happy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will works with the Virginia Symphony Orchestra.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Baby, won’t you keep me? / Baby, please keep me / I need a love to keep me happy_

“Her exact words. You _swear_?”

Will laughs at Zeller’s determined expression. He says, “Yeah, she specified the ‘scruffy one’. I can only assume she meant you.”

“I’ll be damned.” He puffs out his chest, a gesture made all the more hilarious by how unconscious it looks.

Beverly chokes on her water and Price pats her back with a wide smile on his face. When she recovers she says, “When the hell do we get to meet these friends of his? I’m ready to swap dirt like no one’s business.”

“I second that,” Price adds daintily over his Pepsi.

“They’re not going to be back from the tour until December,” Will gets out in a rush. “Believe me, they’re ready to meet you, too.”

“Well, obviously. The need to gossip is strong. What’s it been now, two months?”

“Two whole months,” Will says self-deprecatingly. “I mean, considering we were headed more in the direction of a one-night stand, I guess that is pretty impressive, but still, Zeller, two months. We’re in the process of figuring things out.”

“What’s there to figure out? You like him, he likes you. What’s left?”

Beverly rolls her eyes so that Will doesn’t have to. Price pats Zeller on the shoulder and tells him, “Careful, Brian. Project any harder and you’ll actually look like a spider monkey.”

“Who looks like a spider monkey?”

They all turn at the same time to look at Miriam who laughs when they inform her of Brian’s current predicament. Will removes himself from the ruckus a few minutes later to finish his lunch in peace and accepts Miriam’s following him with grace, though he’s minutely frustrated—turns out Hannibal had a point about Will not eating when he’s distracted. She’s here on business, though, so he can’t exactly complain. He’d be just fine, but he’s burnt out from staring at pages of notation for the four hours previous in his office. Bowman at least brought him coffee, as some gesture of gratitude, he thinks, for getting him out of opera studies.

His head is still pounding, but it’ll be worth it when the players get in one to play. Will’s got the music burned in his mind at this point. If he wanted to, he could recite the music backwards for every instrument.

He makes himself eat his sandwich and lets her guide their conversation. When she brings them up, they talk about the group selected to play in the orchestra this year. She names out a precious few that she’s especially fond of, but he can tell by the gleam in her eyes that she likes all of them a great deal. Will can relate to that, certainly. He’s seen how competent they all are, no matter if he singles them out or evaluates them together with their sections.

When asked if any of them have caught his attention yet, Will lists the first four players that come to mind, though he really only means it for one of them. They’re a spectacular group of people with admirable energy and plasticity, but only one of them really sticks in Will’s mind as exemplary. That one player is Peter Bernardone.

Of all the members in the orchestra with whom Will has become acquainted, he likes Peter the best. He tells Miriam as much, and she merely nods knowingly.

His playing speaks for itself, and no one, not the conductor or even the director herself has to gush about it for him. After he’s finished his sandwich, Miriam asks if she can sit in on their rehearsal, and he politely grants her his leave to do so. It’s not as if he minds, really. He already stands upon a pedestal for the orchestra. One more person isn’t going to scare him out of his position now.

It wouldn’t, at least, if it had just been Miriam, but she brings Jack who also brings Beverly who called Price and Zeller to come along. And okay, that’s not so bad, but they haven’t seen him in action yet, and it’s slightly nerve-wracking to show off for them when the piece isn’t quite polished just yet.

Especially with the more somber overtones of their selection, his nerves start acting up as soon as he taps the top of his stand with his baton to call the orchestra to attention. He’d feel worse, though, if they’d given him Mahler’s 1st instead of his 9th. The more whimsical, light-hearted composition would have made him feel silly for a debut performance. The 9th is of a far more serious nature, and he’ll be able to ground himself in its silent words that succinctly _sing_ of suffering.

Maybe he would have liked to do the 5th symphony better, but one can’t always get what he wants. In the meantime, the orchestra before him alternate between getting their things together and stealing glances at Will’s audience by the door. Their eyes are expectant and curious—all but Peter’s. Will’s guests are out of the way, but their presence is unannounced and so, peculiar. The musicians recognize Miriam and probably Jack, but many of them won’t know Beverly, Price, or Zeller.

“These are my colleagues,” he explains, pushing his glasses up higher on his nose. “They’re here to gawk at me, not at you, I promise.”

Will sees Peter smiling with his head tilted against the scroll of his cello and tries to relate to his peace of mind, to the total lack of self-consciousness with which Peter walks and plays. Will knows better than that, though. He knows Peter isn’t unaware of others but rather keyed in so completely that compartmentalization has become second nature to him. Will’s had experience with that for himself where his own mind is concerned.

He thinks to introduce the still-gawking colleagues but has an awkward feeling about taking too much time to focus on them and instead says, “Please turn to Im Tempo eines gemächlichen Ländlers. We’ll begin there.”

Will keeps his hands clasped before him and waits for Peter to locate and test the braille note heads of the second movement. He glosses down the first and second page, jogging his memory, and positions his bow at his knee. Will holds the pause a few seconds longer until the quiet shuffle of pages stops before lifting his hands and alerting Peter by tapping the side of his stand once with his baton. He counts off and cues Peter in with a noisy inhale that they’ve negotiated as one of many nonvisual signals. They set right into the music, and Will lets himself go with it, that being the only option when he has to concentrate on every note, key change, and increase or decrease in tempo.

It’s a fairly long piece of music. The entire symphony amasses to something in the vicinity of an hour and fifteen-twenty minutes, and he’s timed their performance so far at an hour and twenty five. Going off his figuring, a portion or portions of their rendition drag where they shouldn’t. It’s his job now to find that excess and trim it off before they present to the public.

He stops them about seven minutes in to comment on the brass section and fine tune the violas for a handful of measures before singling out the clarinets and working with them. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Jack nod to Miriam and quietly leave the room. He looks over and meets Miriam’s eyes before nodding at Price, Zeller, and Beverly as they follow Jack’s exit. Miriam raises her eyebrows at him and pulls up a chair near the door. He tips his head to say, _Sure._

Nearly an hour later after they’ve trudged through a good chunk of Rondo-Burleske, Miriam pulls him aside to sum up her observations to this point. Apparently, he locks his knees every time the music picks up in pace or volume, and he hones in too much on the bass and alto sections, which leaves the treble clefs unsupervised. Apart from those notes, she looks pleased with what he’s demonstrated thus far. He’s honestly amazed at the sincerity of her smile when she tells him so.

“Don’t look so surprised,” she teases him. “You should be proud of yourself. Not many people are so quick to understand how this works. You’re a natural, Will Graham.”

He feels his face warm at that and can only smile as she shakes his hand. They walk together to the door, the orchestra members talking softly amongst themselves as they go.

When the door’s closed, someone from woodwinds asks, “So how’d it go, Will? We pass the test?”

Will walks back to his place before them and picks out the person who’d spoken and very deliberately chokes back his laugh. Baker—the flautist who’d spoken, Will _thinks_ that’s his name—sends off a dangerous sort of vibe to which Will absolutely cannot respond. Laughing at his jokes or smiling at him specifically will get him into trouble later. He knows well enough at this point in his career how something of that nature would go. That’s not even to mention Hannibal, Christ.

Will can’t blame (he checks the seating chart) Matthew Brown for that. It’s not like he knows better than to flirt, though he really could by the very public nature of Will’s relationship with Hannibal.

“Well, we’ll know in approximately three months,” Will answers belatedly, shuffling through his papers for their stopping place. He conducts the music by memory but keeps track of alterations with a pencil he tucks behind his ear while leading them. “Lass already knows you belong here,” he says to all of them collectively. “She’s got to make sure I know what I’m doing.”

He might be better advised not to give them so much information about himself, but he’s more than a little accustomed by now to a distinct lack of privacy in his life. Besides, they all know he hasn’t exactly earned his stripes here, and he won’t be doing himself any favors by trying to dance around that fact.

At the end of their session he speaks to a few of the musicians separately, giving criticism and encouragement anywhere those words are needed. One of the orchestra’s younger oboists if not the youngest of the whole group has a stylistic question about the Allegro that Will answers for him. Pride swells up in his chest at the quick spark of recognition in Nicholas Boyle’s eyes when he understands immediately what Will is telling him.

Needlessly, Will asks, “Does that clear it up?”

“Yeah, Will, thanks.” He smiles, looking fresh faced and enthusiastic.

“All right, great. I’ll see you on Monday.”

Nicholas tips his head and goes back to get his things, accidentally knocking his hip into Peter’s stand and sending his sheet music fluttering to the ground. It gives Will a reason to brush Matthew off when he approaches him. He crouches near Peter’s chair and collects the pages, saying, “Here, let me help you with that.”

Peter unscrews the peg at the bottom of his cello and neatly tucks the instrument into its case. “Thanks, Will.”

“It’s no problem, Peter. Where do you keep your music?” he asks, rising to place the sheet music back into its rightful folder.

“In my hand,” he answers with a small smile. 

Peter reaches out to receive the folder and Will places the long edge of the folder against his palm. The last few people shuffle out of the room, leaving Will to gather up his belongings with only Peter to speak to him in the interim. He slings his messenger bag over his shoulder after sliding his papers and borrowed baton inside. Peter pulls his cello over his shoulder and navigates to the end of the aisle, unfolding a white cane after he clears the chairs.

“I think you belong here just as much as any of us do, by the way” he says, standing in place with his head tilted back slightly and his cane tapping the ground at his feet aimlessly. “Miriam’s a good judge of ability. If she didn’t think you could take it, she would have chosen someone else for the job.”

Will comes to his side and tells him, “I believe that.”

Peter laughs quietly, ducking his head modestly as he catches what Will is actually agreeing to. He turns fractionally to the right, responding to Will’s approximate location. He says, evenly, “Don’t think I wasn’t vetted just like everyone else.”

“Oh, I know you were. I’ve seen your marks.”

“One thing to perform well for judges,” Peter says sagely in his characteristically muted voice. He pivots again, in the direction of the door. “Performing well for a crowd—that’s another animal entirely.”

Will smiles and gets the door for Peter, following after him into the wide, high-ceilinged corridor. Their footsteps echo loudly, so Will matches his feet with Peter’s to make as little unnecessary noise as possible. They come to the parking lot, and a man Will’s seen before comes jogging to meet them. They’ve met but only in passing during times such as these at the end of the work day. Today’s been uncharacteristically long for the since they started after lunch and continued until after sunset, but they handled it like champions.

Ingram’s about Peter’s height, shorter than Will but only by a few inches. He wears a consistently pleasant smile on his generically handsome face and dresses in very coordinated suits that make him look a lot like a lawyer. Will doesn’t actually know what he does for a living. All he knows is that Peter’s moderately serious about him, at least to the point of their having established a routine and comfortable domesticity between them. 

Curtly he says, “Hello, Mr. Graham. Let me get that for you, Pete.”

Peter refuses to surrender his cello but yields the folder easily. Will bites his cheek around an uncouth laugh and quickly clears his throat at Ingram’s cross look.

“Uh, sorry,” he manages. “Good night, Peter; Mr. Ingram.”

“Good night, Will,” Peter calls after him.

Will’s still in earshot by the time he clears the stairs and can make out Peter’s words: “No, I’m fine, Clark.”

He looks over his shoulder conspicuously and trips over his feet when someone calls his name from behind. Will rights himself and turns, searching with his eyes for the speaker and stopping at one of the only other cars in the parking lot.

“Sorry,” Matthew Brown says sheepishly from behind the lifted hood of an old truck. “Did I scare you?”

“No, um, surprised. You surprised me.” Will squints at Brown around the metal obstructing his figure from view like a curtain. “What are you doing?”

“You know, just…hanging out,” Matthew replies distractedly. His head pokes out around the side of the vehicle, a comically innocent look on his face. “She’s sort of an antique, uh…”

Will gets an eyeful of said antique and decides, yes, Matthew’s probably right about that. The truck’s a dull blue Chevy, probably a 1980’s model. It’s not in bad shape, all told, but it is old and probably needs some pricey repairs to run at full capacity.

Uncertain, Will asks, “Do you need a jump?”

“No, no, I’m okay. It just needs some fiddling with…” He trails off and rounds the car to duck into the passenger’s side through the opened window.

Will opens his mouth but doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do or if he’s meant to stick around. He looks around and lifts his hand in a wave when Clark drives by, looking from him to Matthew and smirking as he takes the sleek BMW out of the empty lot. Will frowns at the red tail lights that flash red at him and shakes his head.

“Good night, Matthew.”

“Night,” he calls back, clearly not offended by Will’s choice to leave—and thankfully so.

He’s not far from home, but he still drives faster than he strictly needs to, behind schedule as he is. Ingram smirking at him implanted an unsettling feeling right in his chest that hasn’t left him yet. There’s nothing for it. At least he’s not another journalist looking to write a story.

Unless he is, in which case that would make him a tremendous pain in Will’s ass. Surely he can’t be so unlucky as to have _two_ journalists dog him in the same year. Even if Ingram wanted to spin some toxic story about Will and Matthew Brown, flautist, he doesn’t have much going for him outside of just his word. He’ll save the thought for later if it’s one he needs to consider, but he doesn’t foresee it being a problem. Ingram doesn’t strike him as someone who will make waves for no reason. As long as he’s good to Peter, Will won’t make waves either.

He pulls up in the drive right as Hannibal’s finishing dinner, which he mostly guesses from the warm, savory smell of the house when he walks in. Abigail comes out of the kitchen to check that it’s him and waves.

Will gets all of his things put away in their proper places and makes a stop by the dog bowls to make sure they’ve got food. Hannibal glances his way from the stove and smiles, wearing a starched white apron that Will doesn’t recognize. He kisses him on the mouth, initially meant to be a quick peck. It deepens almost incidentally, Will parting his lips around a pleased sound that Hannibal returns.

“Hi,” Will says, making himself pull away for propriety’s sake.

“How was work?”

“It was good,” Will hedges, giving a generic answer for what feels like a generic question. Hannibal raises an eyebrow at him, so he revises: “I’ll tell you about it later.”

Later when they’re in bed, probably. Because that’s a thing that they’re going to do, sleep in the same bed again.

He feels like a teenager being excited about these small things that comprise a relationship: sharing meals, spending down time together, bonding jointly with Abigail. Will remembers what she said before about Marissa taking her kitten home today.

“How was your day? Was Abigail gone a long time?”

“She came back nearly two hours ago. Apparently she saw Mischa at Margot and Elise’s home. She decided to take her kittens today, too.”

“Oh, both of them?”

Will scrunches Hannibal’s shirt in his fingers, realizing after the fact that he’s wrapped his arms around his waist. Hannibal smiles at him and says, “She said she would keep the female for me until I come home in December.”

Will’s mouth falls open, but the words he wants don’t come. He just laughs for lack of anything witty to say. “Ha!”

“It was your suggestion,” Hannibal protests, revealing his teeth in an entertained smirk. “My sister could grow attached to this kitten in the time that it will take for me to claim her for my own. Officially, the kitten belongs to her.”

“Have you thought about names?” Will asks, biting his lip around a grin.

“No, not exactly. I haven’t discerned her personality yet.”

“You should get on that then.”

“In the meantime Mischa has taken to calling her Kačiukas, which may well remain her name if she begins responding to it.”

“Is that Lithuanian for…” Will squints. Hannibal tilts his head to the side, giving nothing away. Will tries, “Is it kitten?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Nailed it.”

“Quite.”

“What is she calling her kitten then, if ‘kitten’ is already taken?”

“She has been considering the names of Greek gods. I think she likes Dionysus.” He shrugs. “She won’t listen to my arguments for that being a highly ironic name for a small animal.”

Will sputters a laugh. He shouldn’t find that funny, but he really does.

Abigail comes back into the room to take the food out to the table. Bless her for giving them space for as long as she did, though Will still has to untangle his arms from around Hannibal’s waist. They sit down to eat, and Will tells them a bit more about his day: he mentions Beverly, Price, and Zeller asking about Hannibal’s friends, he mentions Miriam’s evaluation of his performance, and he mentions Peter. Matthew Brown doesn’t come up in his summary of events, but he does provide Ingram’s name as a side note when he tells of how he saw Peter out after rehearsal concluded.

Hannibal smirks at his plate when he hears about him. It makes Will feel better about his own dislike for Clark Ingram—more justified in it, perhaps: strength in numbers and all that.

“What did you two do with your day?”

Abigail goes first when prompted and talks a bit about the kittens and Margot and Elise. She says Elise let her hold baby Barney.

“He looks so much like Margot.”

Will smiles at that comment. He’s noticed the few times he’s seen Barney that he has Margot’s nose. “How are she and Elise doing?”

“They’re okay. There was some guy who came to the house as we were leaving, though. He was kind of weird. It didn’t look like Elise wanted him there, but he kept asking to see Margot.”

“Huh. Did he give them any trouble?”

“Uh, well…” Abigail hesitates, frowning. “I don’t know. He was sort of standing there in the doorway, and Charlie got too close so he picked her up. Elise got really upset and took her from him. I don’t know what his deal was.”

Will has half a mind to call and check on them, but they’re not quite on those terms where he trusts that gesture to be a welcome one—not yet, anyway. He hopes they will be eventually, but pushing his case isn’t going to facilitate that shift in their friendship. Whoever it was, he trusts that Margot and Elise will have handled him.

“And you? Did you stay here after I left this morning?”

Hannibal drops his eyes to the table with a small smile curving his lips. “I may have serenaded your dogs.”

Will makes a noise in between a laugh and ‘aww’ that makes Abigail choke on her Rouladen Hausfrauenart. Hannibal laughs at him, too, and Will blushes around a too-big gulp of wine.

It’s Friday night and rehearsals with the symphony only run four days out of the week, so they’ll have the morning to sleep in, which is fantastic. Will finds himself daydreaming about it while they’re washing the dishes side by side in the kitchen. Abigail’s the one to snap him out of it when she breaks out the root beer and starts making floats.

“Oh,” he hears Hannibal say.

Will stops what he’s doing to stare at Hannibal, strangely anticipating what he’s going to say next.

“I’ve never had one of those.”

“What?” Abigail asks so that Will doesn’t have to. “You’ve never had a root beer float?”

“I believe Donald may have recommended them to me before, but I never got around to trying one.”

“Do…do you want to now?”

“Yes, please,” Hannibal says agreeably with a warm smile on his face that makes Will melt against the side of the sink. The front of his shirt gets wet, but he doesn’t pay any mind to it. He’ll be in pajamas soon enough anyway. Hannibal looks at him while Abigail starts fixing floats and teases, “I’m sensing that this is a tradition for the two of you.”

Will wrinkles his eyebrows but thinks about it. “Actually, yeah.”

Abigail snorts. “This is the first thing you ever made for yourself after you stopped taking the Percocet.”

“I made coffee while I was _on_ the Percocet,” Will objects, rightfully affronted. “Wait, is that why you always make them?”

Abigail gives him a look that’s amusement and subtle solemnity. “Yes.”

The buzzing space of Will’s mind goes quiet with something like stunned appreciation and awe. On the surface he just looks down and nods. “That makes sense then.”

But apparently he’s not as discreet about his feelings as Abigail is because Hannibal winds an arm around his back and holds him. He takes the first float Abigail hands him and waits for the warning clearly perched on her lips: “If you don’t like it, that one can be Will’s.”

Hannibal takes a careful sip through the striped bendy straw and swallows, blinking and licking his lips thoughtfully. Will asks him what his verdict is, and Hannibal answers with, “Hmm.”

Will leans against him and watches him examine his opinion of the root beer float with interest. Hannibal appears to be infinitely intrigued by the flavors, but Will can’t tell if it’s in a good way or not. After another long sip he hands it off to Will.

“So that’s a no, then?” Will takes a long sip of his own, making a surprised noise when Hannibal leans in abruptly to kiss him. It’s not filthy, but there is tongue involved, definitely—just a quick swipe and a thoughtful hum that follows. Flushed, Will remarks, quite intelligently, “Feels like a yes, for me.”

Abigail sputters a laugh in their general direction. “You two are shameless.”

Will starts to disentangle himself, but Abigail’s already making her calculated exit from the kitchen with her float in hand and the soda and ice cream still out for them to do with it as they wish. He looks at Hannibal once she’s left and whispers, “You’re horrible.”

Hannibal muses, “Then why do you love me, I wonder?”

Will huffs. “Are we sharing mine, or do you want your own? Because I’m telling you, two will last us longer.”

He hears Abigail laughing again in the other room and rubs his hand over his face, remembering to be embarrassed.

“Was this really the first thing you made for yourself when you were taken off the Percocet?”

Will drops his hand to his side. They haven’t really spoken about this part of his healing process yet: the drug-induced state that was his life when he first came home from the hospital. Hannibal’s expression softens and then returns to something neutral. He says, “You don’t have to tell me about it.”

“Do you think I don’t want to?” Will asks in a soft voice to match Hannibal’s.

“Perhaps not here in the kitchen over root beer floats.”

“Floats, plural,” Will clarifies, clumsily changing the subject. “Whip up another one for you?”

“Yes, please, Will.”

Hannibal holds his hand to the small of Will’s back, a warm, pleasant weight that makes Will’s heart feel too big in his chest. He leans back enough to press his back against Hannibal’s chest comfortably.

They end up on the couch, Will in between Abigail and Hannibal on either end, watching the last hour of Frankenstein. It’s part of some premature marathon in the spirit of Halloween—a handful of TV stations have taken to airing these older films now that they’ve slid into the month of October. Will doesn’t mind it. He likes the Karloff film, black and white rendering and all.

Hannibal appears to enjoy it, too, smiling or laughing at odd places in the movie. Abigail blows bubbles through her straw at one quiet part and nestles her shoulder in against Will’s. She settles in next to him, and when Will searches out Hannibal’s hand, he gives it freely to be held. Will’s safe here, and Abigail and Hannibal are safe, too, with him. 

To say he’s relaxed doesn’t really cover the full extent of it, but he’s content to let it be for tonight. Even as the movie happens in front of them and the dogs come by to sniff at them every few minutes, Will has a hard time concentrating on anything outside of Abigail’s shoulder in line with his collar bone and Hannibal’s knuckles beneath his fingertips. He feels himself nodding off near the end of the film but rouses for the last few minutes and gives a huge yawn as the credits roll.

Abigail hops up off the couch, also yawning and popping her neck as she breaks away for the hallway, telling each of them good night over her shoulder. Winston trots after, lying down outside the bathroom door when she closes it behind her.

“Man, I’m beat.”

“Are you?” Hannibal murmurs, stretching his arms high overhead and exhaling heavily when he drops them again.

“You aren’t?”

“I am,” he concedes. “I went for a run earlier. You have a lot of land to your name.”

Will doesn’t argue that point, but he does recall something he’d said to Hannibal their first night together and smiles.

“What?” Hannibal asks, also smiling, though he doesn’t know why yet.

“I was thinking about the night after the club, when I saw your house for the first time.”

Hannibal’s smile widens for a few seconds like he means to laugh, but he ducks his head instead and rubs at the back of his neck. “It feels like I’ve known you longer than two months.”

“Well, it has been longer than that, technically.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yeah, I do.” Will smiles and leans in to kiss Hannibal on the chin and then on the cheek. He touches the tip of his thumb to Hannibal’s bottom lip. “I think it’ll always amaze me that we ended up here.”

Quietly, Hannibal asks him, “ _Here_ , here?”

Will nods yes, finding that he doesn’t have breath enough in his lungs to speak his confirmation. Hannibal hums once and brushes his fingers along Will’s forehead, moving his hair away from his eyes. He draws a line down Will’s cheek with his thumb and angles his chin to one side before pressing their lips together again.

“You don’t work tomorrow,” Hannibal observes.

“No.”

“What would you like to do?”

Will smiles. “I’ve got something planned for dinner. Abigail’s got work, so she said we could go hunting on Sunday.”

“I like it,” Hannibal replies simply, pushing off the couch and holding his hand out for Will to take.

They roll around a bit once they get into bed but fall asleep relatively quickly. Will’s drained still from being on his feet all day and waving his arms around, and Hannibal’s reasonably tired from his run—three miles, apparently.

In the morning Abigail eats breakfast with them and leaves in time for her afternoon shift. They go walking out back and talk about small things, casually sharing snippets of childhoods, first experiences, lessons learned, and favorite things. It occurs to Will as Hannibal’s lacing their fingers together that while he could go on for hours about his past and the reasoning behind his determined way of loving people, he doesn’t know the most basic things about Hannibal.

“Your favorite color is really purple?”

Like he’s thinking the same thing and finds it equally ridiculous, Hannibal laughs and squeezes his hand. “Can you guess why?”

“There’s a reason?” Will stumbles over some uneven ground. “Huh, okay, did it have to do with…” He scans his knowledge of things that occur in nature with a variant of that color in their pigmentation. “A sunset?”

“Sunrise,” Hannibal corrects, smiling softly, looking totally unaware of the fact. “I saw a picture of Chamonix in my uncle’s study when we went to live with him. The sun was coming up over the horizon, and between the sky and the mountains there was a sea of clouds, tinted blue and lavender in the dawn’s light.”

Will closes his eyes against the autumn sun hanging high overhead in their sky here and now, imagining that sunrise that left such an impression on Hannibal’s mind. He doesn’t know how long after Grutas it was that he’d seen it or if it had been important to him right away when he did, but it’s significant either way. Will trusts that it is with the tone of voice Hannibal uses to speak of it, like it’s a sacred thing to his memory. He can see it in his mind, snow and earth painting the face of Chamonix.

Hannibal’s arm closes around his side when he opens his eyes to find his footing compromised.

“You do that often, you know,” he says gently, unassuming lips aligned with his temple.

“Yeah,” Will sighs. “Sorry about that.”

“It doesn’t bother me. You know I like to catch you.” Hannibal does kiss him then, on his temple and then in his hair. “But I know you dislike that.”

“It’s not so much dislike as it is discomfort.” Will shrugs, noticing that they’ve stopped walking. He wraps his arms around Hannibal’s back instead of beginning their pace anew. “I’m not uncomfortable around you.”

Hannibal’s arms circle around him in turn. “Are you giving me permission to catch you, Will Graham?”

“Within reason,” Will warns, hooking his chin over Hannibal’s shoulder.

“I find those terms perfectly acceptable.”

They stand together outside. It’s hardly sweater weather, but the next season they see together will give them blankets of snow and consistently cold climes. Will pulls back from their cozy embrace when two dogs come sniffing at their legs. Hannibal stays remains at Will’s side but gives him room to crouch and greet Fenris and then Penelope.

“Did you mean to bring me hunting with you and Abigail tomorrow?”

Will looks up, distracted momentarily by Hannibal’s fingers sliding into his hair. “I didn’t know if you’d want to. We were going to talk about it tonight after she gets off work.”

“I think I had rather go see my sister while you’re out. You’ll leave early, will you not?”

“Yeah, that’s what we were thinking. Maybe we can take Abigail’s car, and you can drive mine to Baltimore?”

“If you don’t mind, I would appreciate it.”

“That way you can bond with Kitten.”

Hannibal smiles widely and says, “Kačiukas.”

“That’s what I said,” Will teases, ruffling Penelope’s ears but practicing the name under his breath. “Kačiukas: sounds like a sneeze.”

Hannibal twists Will’s hair around his fingers in a sharp but controlled tug. Will looks up at him, mouth falling open in equal parts shock and immediate arousal. He has a very clear idea of what they will be doing when they go back inside.

“Mind how you speak of my native language,” Hannibal says gently, soothing Will’s scalp with a long stroke of his hand. 

Will can’t help it that the corner of his lip twitches. He can feel that his eyes are still wide open as he breathes, “Yes, sir.”

Hannibal’s mouth falls open, too, surprise written clearly on his features. A lovely red tint flowers into being across his nose. Will sees his pupils dilate before he looks away.

“And you tell me _I’m_ horrible.”

“You are,” Will says evenly, catching his breath and standing to his full height, which makes it easier not to sink completely to his knees before Hannibal. “I’m sorry, though, for saying that. I didn’t even realize it was rude until it was already out of my mouth.”

Hannibal gives him a long look and then looks away, saying dismissively, “Perhaps you can make it up to me.”

“How?” Will comes around Hannibal’s shoulder, worried at his words that Hannibal was more offended than he thought, but the wry, self-satisfied smile on his face tells him that’s not the case. He finds himself smiling, too, going warm in his belly and in his hands. “Oh.”

“I believe that’s appropriate, yes.”

Will laughs and steps in closer, kissing that smile and those familiar words off that mouth he’s come to love so much. The way Hannibal kisses him back leaves absolutely no doubt in Will’s mind that they’re thinking the exact same thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chamonix-Mont-Blanc (at sunset)  
> http://obamapacman.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Sunset-at-Mont-Blanc-France-Italy.jpg


	26. Time Is on My Side

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will hangs out with Hannibal and also enjoys the hell out of his new friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Like I told you so many times before / You’re gonna come back, baby / ’Cause I know / You’re gonna come back knocking / Yeah, knocking right on my door_

The hunting trip goes as planned; they bring home a big haul. Hannibal is completely amazed and seduced (gods be praised). He tries to pass for mildly impressed, but Will sees right through it, and it’s generally hilarious.

Mischa teases Hannibal for it relentlessly even days after the fact, much to Will’s extreme satisfaction. With her sister’s intuition and insight into Hannibal’s mind, his smallest tell gives her a fount of information—some of which is not always appreciated, it should be noted. Will loves to hear all of it, of course, but anything that makes her blush just about kills him, so it’s something of a double-edged sword.

Many of Hannibal’s feelings—not all of them, but a significant amount—are rooted in physical things, so it’s really not suitable material for gossip. Perhaps it could be, but Will really feels like it couldn’t. Their intimacy is for them only, and whatever he learns in passing from Mischa by accident can remain just that: in passing, by accident, and good for a laugh if he needs one, which is actually less often than usual but always very welcome anyway.

Mischa turns up at his house twice in their short week. Will can tell Hannibal meant what he said about her feelings for the commute, as pleasant and kind as she is every time he sees her around. The only noticeable signs of discomfort lie in the agitated fidgeting of her hands and the tapping of her foot whether standing or sitting still. It’s funny to think about since she strikes him as someone who travels by plane, or at least _traveled_ , quite a lot in her life. Hannibal disperses that argument with one word: _melatonin_.

On Wednesday while Will’s at work for another session with the Symphony and Abigail is out with Clarice, Marissa, and Molly, Hannibal ends up at Mischa’s tattoo parlor with Will’s Crown Victoria sitting in the employee parking lot. Will reads Hannibal’s text messages during breaks.

Jesus hell, the shenanigans. He’s like a kid in a candy store.

Mischa’s allegedly told him not to touch anything, so naturally he touches whatever he can quietly get his hands on and promptly sends off a string off highly entertained messages detailing the misdeeds. Will even receives a photo of a mysteriously dark room filled of strange, weaponry-like equipment. He tries to ask, but Hannibal doesn’t really give him a straight answer. More’s the confusion.

Will powers through the rehearsal and firmly ignores the messages piling up in his phone. They’re not insistent, but there’s a certain enthusiasm that rides the wave of the unacknowledged commentary sitting in his pocket. He hangs around late after their session to read through the last six or so that Hannibal sent him in the few hours since he’s been on the pedestal, fixing the dragging sections of Im Tempo eines gemächlichen Ländlers.

A woman called Ardelia was in the shop with Mischa today and looks to have kept Hannibal company, telling him saucy jokes when Mischa had her back turned and winking at Hannibal when Mischa’s back _wasn’t_ turned. Will has half a mind to be jealous, but immediately—and naturally—dismisses it without a further thought. For all of ten seconds he thinks of how profound his trust in Hannibal really is, and all the seconds after that he thinks how perfectly—naturally—it’s been earned in shared secrets, confidences, and all the ways they’ve come together physically and emotionally, betraying all the laws of kismet while they were at it.

He wonders if kismet is an ironic word for them or if it’s the only one that makes any kind of sense. ‘Choice’ feels like a better word: more wholesome, rougher around the edges, and flared with a bit more of their trademark resistance. Hannibal would really like kismet, but Will thinks he’d favor the latter option, too.

Will notices as he’s pocketing his phone and putting his things away that Peter is still seated in the front row of chairs, slowly running his fingers over the pages with his eyes closed. There are a few more people in the room still getting their things together. Matthew Brown is not one of them, but Will does spot Nicholas Boyle by the exit with his violin case in hand and a pretty girl punching him in the shoulder. He has an idle question about who she might be but brushes it off and slowly, noisily approaches Peter, who drops his hand while keeping his eyes closed.

“Hi, Will.”

“Hey, Peter.” Will comes a few steps closer until he can take the emptied seat beside him. Most of the stands have been moved to the far end of the room along the wall, so his path is any easy one. “What’s going on? Usually you’re packed up and ready to go by now.”

“Oh.” He hums and taps his fingers slowly on the body of his cello where the build resembles a shoulder. The instrument still rests easily between his knees. “Clark’s running late.”

Will sits up straighter. “He’s coming, though, right?”

“Yes,” Peter answers calmly. “There’s a situation at work, he said. I told him I could get home by myself if I need to, but he gets upset sometimes when I have to do things unassisted.”

Peter shakes his head like he can feel the uncertain twinge of dislike Will’s letting off.

“It’s not that. He knows I lived alone for years before him, and he knows I can do it again; it’s just that we have a pattern now, and he likes taking care of me. In as much as I let him,” he sneaks in at the end, which does make Will smile a bit in spite of himself.

“Did he give you an estimated wait time?”

Blushing beneath his jawline Peter says, “About an hour.”

Will bites his tongue around his offer to drive Peter home and then decides, _Oh, fuck it._

“I could take you home. It’d be no trouble at all.”

A smile flickers over his mouth. He starts to fuss with the cello scroll nestled right against his head. “Oh, that’s—I really appreciate the offer, Will. Thank you.”

A quiet sigh issues from Will’s lips before he can help it. “Clark doesn’t like me, does he?”

Peter’s face falls for just a moment, but he doesn’t deny it. “Clark likes to think he’s the authority on a lot of things—people included, but he doesn’t pick my friends.”

The last bit causes a proud little burst of happy warmth in Will’s belly. He smiles where Peter can’t see him and looks around briefly at their surroundings. They can technically stay here as they are, undisturbed, until Clark comes to collect Peter from the premises. Peter picks idly at his strings, maybe detecting that Will’s attention has shifted elsewhere for the moment. Everyone has gone and left the room with them. Will turns to look again at Peter’s gently vibrating strings, and his heart pounds in his chest as he gets an idea.

“Well, what if I keep you company until he gets here, at least?”

Peter smiles. “You don’t have anywhere to be? A busy guy like you?”

Will hums and checks his phone. Hannibal hasn’t sent him a message to say that he’s started the voyage home yet, so he’s probably still in Baltimore with his sister. Abigail might be home if she isn’t at the record store.

“For the next hour or so, I am surprisingly free.”

Peter accepts his offer with a small smile and a modest tipping of his head. Will thinks to offer some polite small talk or inquire as to Peter’s life beyond this building and Clark, but instead he opens with, “Could we play something together?”

Knowingly Peter replies, “Ah, I wondered if that was in the cards.”

It’s Will’s turn to duck his head, but Peter just takes up his bow and starts tightening the strings. He collects the violin he brought with him from the Academy for demonstration purposes. As he’s bringing it over, Peter asks him, “What’s your primary instrument, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“Viola.”

“Oh. Why?”

“You mean, why _not_ the violin?” Will asks, grinning around the question that used to aggravate him to no end but now mostly amuses him.

With a note of equally entertained defiance Peter asks, “Why not the _cello?_ ”

Will laughs and fiddles quietly with his tuning. “Ah, well, the cello was a close second. It was actually the first instrument I had any instruction in.”

“Huh, traitor.”

“Yep,” Will replies in such a way that he thinks Peter definitely hears him smiling.

“All right, what are we playing, alto boy?”

Will bites his lip and tightens his bowstrings. “I don’t suppose you know Halvorsen?”

Peter’s head tilts to one side. “By Halvorsen do you mean _Handel_ -Halvorsen?”

Feeling devious and hopeful, Will says, “Passacaglia.”

His jaw drops, features stretching into a smile the very next second. “Let’s do it.”

Will drags his chair around so that he’s more at a diagonal to Peter’s and raises the violin to his shoulder. “Do you have it by heart?”

“Yeah, I might get some passages mixed up. It’s been a while since I played it.”

Peter gets his bow in rest position, waiting for Will’s cue to start. Will treats it like a proper rehearsal and uses the same cues he does when they’re playing with the large group. The piece starts in something like fire with Peter’s cello answering to the impassioned treble part and acting as kindling for the flames produced by that first spark of matched notes. Will closes his eyes as the pieces slow from its hectic build-up into a peaceful fragment of legato, mournful music.

He leans into the easy flow between what he creates and what Peter creates and takes off in a run of pizzicato when they get there in perfect time with each other. After that they’re flying through the next section that’s fast like the first bit was, and Will abuses the neck to make the notes he needs. Near the end they go back and forth with feather-light notes that nearly bounce off their strings, Peter mimicking Will’s except for a few precious variations that may have been incorrectly remembered or stylistically altered but that still work excellently with their established key.

Will lets out a short, stunned breath when they finish and Peter laughs, leaning away from his cello to press his forehead to its back. His laugh is breathless. “That was fun.”

“Let’s play another one.”

They play _Danse macabre_ and afterward launch into a song Peter randomly selects without naming. It’s Vivaldi’s _Winter_ from _The Four Seasons_ , which Will doesn’t actually have memorized—a difficult piece to wing. He has learned it once before at some point in his life, so he isn’t completely left in the dark. Peter plays about five measures alone before Will jumps in, mostly improvising and distantly remembering enough to anticipate the tempo changes, which are very important in this particular song.

Peter notices straight away that Will doesn’t know the song and looks prepared to comment on it in between movements, but Will disperses his need to do so by stealing the lead part of the much more familiar section. After a few long moments of playing the lilting, slow notes on his too-high violin, Peter falls into step with him and hits all the notes he’s meant to. He makes some obvious deviations from the original music, and Will takes it as acceptance and participation in one fell swoop. They get through to the end of the blustery piece, both of them wildly taking liberties but listening to each other to keep track of where they are in the song.

They grin like schoolchildren and Peter waits expectantly for Will to pick a song once they finish the Vivaldi. He chooses _Czardas_ and plays through the entire opening section by himself before Peter lifts his bow to fill in for the cello part. He switches with Will for the backing part when the violin becomes the main focus again, and they alternate back and forth, quite organically picking their way through a very sparse take on Monti’s arrangement.

At some point in the middle of some other song that Peter chooses, the title of which escapes Will’s mind, the door to the room clicks open. Will turns, expecting to see the janitor. He gets Clark Ingram instead.

Peter keeps playing, probably also expecting a cleaning crew or otherwise. Ingram makes no move to approach them but quietly takes a seat in one of the chairs by the door he came in through, so Will continues to play as well, unembarrassed. They sound great together, he and Peter do. He listens the same way that Will does—with his whole body and with his imagination and with a playful sense of adventure Will hasn’t observed in their previous rehearsals. He wonders if it might be worth it to play one-on-one like this with all the musicians in the orchestra—if they might not all benefit immensely from knowing exactly how they play and to what place they escape in their minds to capture the mood, the intensity, the intention…

They stop on a single beat, bows hovering in the air for a silent count of three before Will hears Ingram shuffling to his feet. Will watches Peter listening as his wrist comes to rest at his knee. His eyebrows twitch down, presumably recognizing Ingram’s stride or the sound his shoes make against the tile.

In an unnecessarily questioning tone, he asks, “Clark?”

The reply is muted. “Hey, Pete.”

Voice still light as ever, Peter says, “We lost track of time. Sorry I’m not ready to go.”

“That’s okay, Peter, take your time,” Ingram answers smoothly, tone difficult to place and expression oddly blank. His eyes flick to Will’s. “Hi, Mr. Graham.”

“Mr. Ingram.” Will nods, already standing to his feet.

“I told Will you were going to be late, so he offered to stick around a while,” Peter explains for them as Will retreats to pack up the borrowed violin.

He checks his phone, more out of habit than because he expects anything to be there. The screen displays a missed call from Hannibal which he returns immediately without thinking about the logistics of the situation: still in the room with two other people obviously in hearing range. He packs up the rest of his papers into his bag while the line rings in his ear. Hannibal answers on the fifth ring, a touch of something alcoholic in his voice but only to the point that he sounds warm with drink rather than drunk with it.

“Hey, sorry, I’m on my way home now.”

“You just missed Abigail. She made an excuse about Marissa’s kitten and something called ‘dorbs’.”

Will snorts and shakes his head. “That’s teenage girls for you.”

“She said you’d understand.” He hears the backdoor swing open and dogs running. Hannibal grunts softly and says, not for Will but for one of the dogs, “Go get it.”

“Are you playing with my dogs?”

“Absolutely not.” He huffs slightly and adds, perhaps holding the phone away from his face, “Good boy.”

“You’re playing with my dogs, you liar.” He shoulders his bag and tosses a haphazard glance at Peter and Ingram. Peter’s buckling up his cello case, and Ingram is typing something silently on the touch screen of his phone. “Good night.”

Peter raises his head. “Good night, Will.”

“Night,” Ingram replies, keeping his eyes on his phone.

Will stays on the phone with Hannibal until he gets to his car and then drives home with his phone in his bag and the violin in the backseat. He brings everything inside with him and tells Hannibal about the music with Peter, which he listens to with glassy eyes and an openly intrigued expression on his face. In turn he tells Will more about Mischa’s art and the weird dark room in Vilnia over drinks following a quick dinner. Hannibal ends up tipsy from one too many fingers of whiskey, which Will is surprised to discover that he likes as much as he does. He shoots Abigail a text from the backyard while Hannibal throws a Frisbee around, grateful for her more and more frequent disappearing act but also guilty and mortified.

Luckily Hannibal helps him to forget about the last two. Mostly he does so by being very obnoxiously great in bed and doing splendid things with one of Will’s nicer ties that is now ruined forever for actual work-related things.

One of the nights they had to themselves—the night after the hunt—Will succeeded in getting Hannibal to beg for it. If that’s not the single most ridiculously sexy thing on the face of the earth, Will just doesn’t know how he’s going to live past forty.

Christ in Heaven, Hannibal’s got nearly ten years on him. They should probably be more careful.

Hannibal throws a pillow and his crumpled shirt at Will’s head when he tells him that. Will just laughs and tackles him back onto the bed. He calls it a compromise that Hannibal gets _him_ to beg after _that_.

Things are going pretty great in their slice of wow-we-actually-get-to-have-nice-things-for-once happiness. Will knows better than to trust the lull of domestic bliss; he really, really wholeheartedly does. Hannibal does, too, actually, so there’s no excuse for them to be completely blindsided when something awful does eventually happen.

No matter how much Will truly believes in them at this point, bad things will always have to happen. C’est la vie.

Wednesday night ends with them disheveled but clothed, for the most part, and Thursday morning finds Hannibal sleeping through Will’s alarm. Will wakes him with a kiss, and Hannibal promptly falls back asleep. It’s not a rehearsal day, but Will still has to go in and stare at music for several hours of the day. He uses a good chunk of his time to sit in on his former class Bowman is currently running in his stead.

He treats Will to lunch at a small sandwich shop, and they spend every minute that they’re not eating, talking about their favorite students. Bowman talks about Georgia Madchen, and Will talks about Peter.

“She’s a gift, Will, I can’t get over it.”

“I get it,” Will says emphatically because he does. He tells Bowman about the impromptu jam session with Peter the night previous. Bowman answers with a story from last week wherein Georgia opened the classroom door on him as he was coming in and spilled his coffee all over him.

“She’s great,” he says dreamily.

Will hides behind his glass of iced tea and resolutely does not laugh.

On Thursday night he and Hannibal are invited over for dinner with Margot and Elise at their home in Baltimore. Will is thrilled and Hannibal is pleased for him by association. He genuinely admires Margot and to a somewhat lesser extent, enjoys Elise’s company. It’s clear, though, that the thing that makes the night a good prospect for him is how happy it makes Will to be invited at all. He doesn’t treat it like it’s charity. Neither of them does; it’s part of what makes the night that much brighter and far more hopeful than Will ever lets himself feel about anything.

They’re halfway through a modest dinner of Chicken Marbella when Barney begins to cry upstairs. Margot excuses herself to see to him, and Elise acts as hostess until her return. Hannibal compliments the chicken and Elise blushes.

She gingerly sips her water. “How have the kittens been behaving?”

“They’ve not been, generally,” Hannibal muses back. “Mischa absolutely adores them both.”

“She might just claim that Tortie of yours for her own,” Elise teases.

“It would be for the best, I’m sure.” Hannibal ducks his head, smiling and looking endearingly chagrined. “She makes quite the impression.”

Elise gives Will an alarmed look. “You may have some competition for this man’s heart after all.”

Just like that, it’s Will who’s stammering and grinning at the table while Hannibal gives him an unabashedly besotted look. They’re perfectly saccharine; it’s a wonder anyone tolerates them in the same room together for long periods of time. Maybe Will ought to reconsider Abigail’s reasons for staying clear of the house after all.

Margot comes back in time to miss their absurdly romantic, syrupy exchanges over which Elise fawns helplessly like she’s never seen anything sweeter than two grown men making fools out of themselves over each other. It’s anyone’s guess whether that’s actually what she’s thinking. Will’s been doing his best to keep his interpretations of events, reactions, et cetera, to and _from_ himself. 

He’s making friends. It’s easy and light; there’s banter and playful jabs and inside jokes flowering into being left and right. Margot even laughs at a joke Will makes while Hannibal gives his knee a firm squeeze under the table.

She invites them upstairs to get a peek at Barney while he’s in between naps. Hannibal hangs back in the doorway with Margot, speaking in hushed tones about something Will only vaguely attends to. His eyes are on the baby boy in the crib gurgling and batting meaty little hands in the direction of the mobile a ways above his head. Elise waves him closer, and before he understands what’s happening, baby Barney is being placed in his arms and Will is sucking in a surprised, overwhelmed breath and then forgetting to let go of it afterward.

“Oh,” he starts to say, but it gets lodged in the back of his throat.

“Well, look at you,” Elise murmurs, and he can hear her loud and clear where her head is bowed near Barney’s head to nudge his purple beanie properly into place. She raises her eyes to him and smiles widely. Her next words to him are fond. “You have a knack for holding babies, Will Graham. He can be fussy.”

“Maybe Will Graham can change his diapers and clean up his vomit,” Margot mutters not unkindly.

“Whose idea was it to have a baby?” Elise asks, turning a pointed look on Margot who rolls her eyes.

She says, “Yours, technically, if you want to play it that way.”

Will tears his eyes away from Barney’s huge blue eyes to see Elise’s face go blank with confusion and then cherry red with the memory of something obviously profound and not at all Will’s business. Hannibal appears to understand, too, though, which makes it harder not to react. He chuckles and Hannibal discreetly covers his mouth.

“Oh, my God, _Margot_.”

Leaning very casually against the doorframe Margot says with a little smirk, “That’s about what you said when you brought up kids the first time.”

Miserable, except perhaps not really, Elise mutters, “You’re shameless.”

“If I recall, that’s part of why you like me so much.”

“I _love_ you,” Elise corrects her, crossing over to the door to loop her arm around Margot’s back. “Shameless mother of my child that you are.”

Hannibal casually leaves Margot’s side to stand by Will. He studies Barney’s face for about five inquisitive seconds of silence before raising a hand to Barney’s tiny socked foot and wiggling his toes. Will bites his cheek to keep from laughing and then laughs outright anyway, doing his best not to jostle Barney too much in the process.

“Here, take him—oh, I mean…”

Margot nods when he looks up at her. “It’s okay.”

Hannibal gives her a questioning look, too, but her expression doesn’t falter. He turns that mildly perplexed, slightly terrified expression on Will and then uncertainly holds his arms out to receive the baby. Will surmises that his reaction must be because it’s Margot and Elise’s baby more than it is because he’s terrified of holding _any_ baby. He knows Hannibal’s been around kids—Donald’s nieces and nephews primarily since his brothers all have children that are younger than Nemean Lion, the band.

“He has your nose,” Hannibal remarks softly, looking for a brief second at Margot and then at Elise. His gaze lands on Will and he smiles. Barney makes a fist around the fingers tapping idly at his shirtfront. There’s nothing else for it, so Will smiles back at him. Hannibal whispers, awed, “Quite an extraordinary thing, to have a child.”

The doorbell rings downstairs. Elise starts to slip away to get it, but Margot motions for her to stay and makes for the door herself. Whoever’s down there knocks three times, loudly, and then rings the bell again.

“Are you expecting someone?” Will asks, bunching his fingers up against Hannibal’s forearm where his hand has wandered of its own volition.

Elise shifts a bit on her feet, looking a bit like she isn’t sure whether she should stay where she is or move. “No.”

Will opens his mouth to say something, but Margot’s voice filters up from downstairs. It’s not quite loud enough to be a yell, but the muscles in Hannibal’s arm immediately stiffen beneath Will’s hand. Elise gently bumps the doorframe with her forehead and quickly excuses herself before breezing down the hall and out of sight. Will goes to the open doorway and trots soundlessly down the hall to the railing that overlooks the foyer. He peers around the wall to get a look at whoever it is that’s giving their hosts a problem.

It shouldn’t surprise him that he’s never seen the guy before. He’s ordinary on the surface: crazy hair, well-dressed, glasses. Will hears the man refer to Barney as his nephew and pads soundlessly back to the nursery, counting his blessings that he hasn’t been spotted. Downstairs the uninvited man _shouts_ , “You can’t keep me from my _family_ , Margot. It’s _indecent_.”

Barney starts to cry. Will swings into the room and sees Hannibal hurriedly gathering him up from his crib.

“I set him down for just a second,” he explains in a single rushed, whispered sentence. Will stands by Hannibal’s side, trying to soothe Barney’s nerves, but his wailing cries only dissolve into screams. Hannibal gives him a plaintive look. “Maybe you should try.”

“What?”

Hannibal slows down his frantic rocking to say, “He was calm with you.”

“I…”

Will starts to hold out his arms, but a series of outraged protests sound from downstairs. Heavy footsteps crash up the stairs and toward them via the hallway. They both look reluctantly to the door, Will already forming a one-man barricade between Hannibal and the man from downstairs, presumably Margot’s or Elise’s brother.

He’s winded, but he doesn’t _look_ particularly violent. Aggressive, hell yeah, but violence would be taking it too far too fast. There’s a smile on his face that’s more cruel and ironic than it is compassionate, but that drops away from his face when his gaze slides off of Will and onto Barney, his supposed nephew. His mouth drops open and his eyebrows furrow in something like confusion.

Margot comes up behind him and says in a deathly calm voice, “You need to get the hell out of here, Mason.”

Hannibal turns around behind Will. He hears a small gasp and Hannibal’s teeth clicking together in his mouth. Something like amusement trickles into Mason’s expression. He surprises them all by saying, in a strange, lilting voice that resembles Abel’s way of speaking only slightly, “Long time no see, Hannibal.”

Will notices belatedly that Barney is still screaming somewhere behind him.

Before any of them can react, Elise carefully works her way around Margot who’s standing in the door again and comes up behind Mason hard and fast. She twists one of his arms behind his back and shoves him into the nearest wall, knocking one of the framed photos off the wall.

“Here’s how this works,” is all Will hears her say to him.

Margot rushes in past him to extract Barney from Hannibal’s arms. To their mutual credit, she looks more rattled by what’s happened than upset about Hannibal’s apparent ties to her clearly unwelcome brother. Hannibal looks rattled _and_ upset, but mostly upset. Mason keeps giving him perplexed looks over his shoulder that Will likes less and less the longer they last. At number three, Hannibal briskly leaves the room. Margot does, too, for the purpose of taking Barney into another room while her partner continues to twist Mason’s arm in a very figurative sense.

Will slowly takes the stairs to the ground floor and finds Hannibal sitting in the kitchen with his hands folded before him on the table. He looks calm on the surface, but Will knows better than that, too.

Careful not to accuse, he says, “You never told me you dated her brother.”

“I did, actually,” Hannibal murmurs, sounding like he’s two minutes away from dropping in exhaustion. “He’s the reason I failed to remember our first meeting.”

Will stands for a moment longer in silence and then pulls out the chair next to Hannibal’s. Barney’s cries cease finally, and two sets of footsteps come thundering down the stairs.

Without getting a visual on them, Mason calls out, “I’m surprised you didn’t jump at the chance to hit me again, Hannibal! Surprised, and a little hurt!”

The door slams shut, the locks slat into place, and the house is still for a very long few moments. Outside a car starts and speeds off. A single pair of footsteps gently ascends the stairs, wordless and Will thinks, without a lick of judgment to them. That’s Elise anyway; her priorities are upstairs, and Will knows straight away where her heart is right now. He has no idea what Margot will think of the whole thing—if it will matter or if it will ruin everything.

Ruin _dinner_ , he revises, this _night_.

Nothing else changes because of this. It wouldn’t be fair. Will knows Hannibal comes with a past. If this is what happens next, then this is what happens next. Will’s with him and he’s not going anywhere, especially not now with Hannibal looking like he wants to die.

“You never told me his name,” Will prompts softly, keeping his hands to himself but doing nothing to lean away from Hannibal or put distance between them.

Hannibal’s breathing picks up just slightly, stutters on the way in and out, and then stills for a count of four before leaving him in an explosive sigh. He drops his head into his hands and his elbows on the table.

“I’m sorry, Will.”

“Hannibal,” he whispers, scooting his chair closer and making a point to drag the legs as he does so that Hannibal won’t be alarmed by his proximity when he speaks again. “I’m not angry.”

Ducking his head closer into his chest and running his fingers through his hair, Hannibal says, “He never told me his sister’s name. I only knew he had one because he would mention her if I ever brought Mischa up in conversation. We weren’t…we didn’t _have_ that kind of…”

They fall silent when a door upstairs opens and closes. Only one set of footsteps comes down to them. It turns out to be Elise, flushed and with a lock of blonde hair sticking to her forehead. She comes into the kitchen with them and stands, clocking Hannibal’s obvious distress as well as Will’s sensitivity to it. Whatever she came in meaning to say has gone out of her mind and she deflates, falling into the chair opposite Will’s.

“Well, that’s not the night we wanted to share with you.”

Will rubs his hand clockwise and then counterclockwise in between Hannibal’s shoulder blades. He relaxes by degrees.

“I’m impressed with how you handled it,” Will dares to admit, flashing a relieved smile when Elise gives him one of her own. “That wristlock was like something out of my dreams.”

Elise chuckles under her breath. “Yeah, my dad insisted on it when I went away for college.” She steals a glance at Hannibal who is still resting his forehead against his knuckles with his shoulders bunched up and his back curved outward like a protective shell. 

“That’s great that he did. I always worry about Abigail, but she already knows how to handle a gun, a knife, the works…” 

She notices his voice trailing off, and Hannibal does, too. The hand propping his head up that’s nearest to Will’s body searches out his hand and holds on, firm and sure and warm. Elise watches their hands for a few seconds, deciding something, and says, in a voice that’s neither big nor small, “I had cancer.”

Will lets her catch his gaze and then holds it, though it makes his skin feel jittery and tight. Hannibal doesn’t let him go. He asks, “When you went away for college?”

“Yeah, it was…hard, going to school while also…undergoing…yes.” She flashes a tight smile and sighs around a quiet laugh. “We caught it early, so it wasn’t a big deal, but it’s always in the back of my mind that it could come back, you know?” Elise looks down. Tone softening and becoming more thoughtful, she says, “Margot’s family’s always been healthy. Well, there’s some male-patterned baldness, which, sorry, Barney.”

Will squeezes Hannibal’s hand and smiles because Elise is smiling, too.

“Um, but the labored point that I’m trying to make is,” she says brightly as the natural coloring sifts back into her face, “that that part of my life had to be cut out of me for me to get better, and…and that’s what Mason is like for Margot. It’s like the air is harder for her to breathe if he’s around.”

Hannibal raises his head then, as if he understands the point she’s trying to make and feels the need to object.

“It’s okay,” she murmurs in a maternal tone that chides in the same beat that it sympathizes. “It’s not like it’s a deep, dark secret from my past. We’ve had a crisis situation; bonding is good for that.”

A muscle near Hannibal’s mouth twitches, but he doesn’t argue with her. His frown is still very pronounced, but the tension in his frame has mostly dissipated.

When she sees that he has no intention of pushing the issue, she continues in a calm voice: “We were angry at first—I mean, obviously we were because Mason is an idiot and thinks he can barge into people’s houses unannounced, but…we thought you weren’t being honest with us. Maybe you weren’t,” she cedes gently, “but I don’t think you realized that you weren’t, and it’s hard to be mad at you when you look so sad.”

Bless his heart, Hannibal tries to laugh and confesses, “I worried that you would be upset with Will because of me.”

“Hey,” Will interjects mutedly.

“I second that,” Elise murmurs tiredly but still managing a tired smile. She shakes her head. “This isn’t the first time he’s come around trying to see Barney. It’s not your fault any of it happened the way that it did. I could have stopped him before he came in if I’d just gotten the door myself, but we weren’t worried about Mason hurting him, not with the two of you up there.”

She looks down, something like guilt betraying her features. “We were actually sort of hoping he might come one night when we had visitors so he’d see that we’re not totally isolated up here. _That_ plan backfired.”

“I hardly think you need hired muscle to make anyone leave your house,” Will half-teases, half-seriously states.

“Well, maybe not now. I haven’t needed to put him in a headlock so far. He didn’t know I had it in me,” she says, tone darkening just enough to send a chill down Will’s spine. It should be basic knowledge not to mess with new mothers and their families. “Maybe he’ll leave us be now that he _does_ know.”

The door upstairs opens, and they listen for the soft tread of Margot’s stride as she puts Barney back in the nursery. They wait for a few moments in silence, but the floorboards remain undisturbed.

“I think we’ll be calling it a night,” Elise says, an expression equal parts apologetic and weary.

“Us, too,” Will replies, quite arbitrarily but earning a smile for his effort anyway. “Thank you for having us over.”

“I’ll talk to Margot, see how she feels about trying again in December,” she tells Hannibal on their way to the front door. “That’s when you’re back, right?”

“Yes. Elise,” he says, halting with his coat in his hands but not working to get it on. “You have a beautiful family.”

She stares at him for a protracted moment and then smiles softly, lifting her hand to his arm. “Good night, Hannibal.” He shrugs on his coat. Will follows him out the door. “Good night, Will.”

“Good night, Elise.”

They drive home in silence. Will leaves the radio off, and Hannibal stares out the window. The house is empty but for the dogs. Hannibal kisses him when they get inside, the slow, burning type that always builds into something more. Will stops him short, or he tries to.

“I don’t want to think about it,” Hannibal mumbles into his cheek, running two warm hands down Will’s chest, around his sides, up his back beneath his shirt. “Please, I don’t want to think about him.”

“I know, Hannibal, but—”

“What? What is it?” he murmurs back, sounding helpless and breaking Will’s heart.

“I don’t want this to become a distraction,” Will whispers, holding Hannibal close and kissing his cheek and his temple and his hairline. “I don’t want my hands on your body to be a coping mechanism.”

Hannibal buries his face in Will’s neck. “It’s not.”

Will looks around at his living room over Hannibal’s head, lightly scratching his nails over the back of Hannibal’s neck. His eyes land on the TV.

“Come watch a movie with me instead?”

He feels Hannibal thinking it over, maybe even wondering if there’s a way he can persuade Will to do what he wants. After a few deep, shaky breaths, Hannibal agrees, and they watch _Doctor Zhivago_. Hannibal falls asleep in Will’s lap two and a half hours into the very long film. Will cards his fingers through his hair and scrunches his fingers where Hannibal’s unconsciously anchoring his wrist to his sternum. Hannibal’s other hand is loosely laid up against the inside curve of Will’s elbow. His legs are splayed over the end of the couch, and at least four of the dogs have sniffed at him since he drifted off.

Will turns off the movie once he’s sure Hannibal won’t stir with the sudden loss of background noise. He watches his face in the darkness, features slack and calm but not peaceful, exactly. Something to his dreams carries the distress from the night, or maybe he’s getting a crick in his neck. Will wakes him a while later when he feels himself starting to doze off, and they move their act to his bedroom.

Hannibal stays near the edge of his side of the bed, and Will is having none of that nonsense, so he wriggles over into the middle space of the mattress and draws Hannibal back toward him. He doesn’t resist, but he does look displeased at first, which makes Will pause in his course. They look at each other. Hannibal drops his eyes, releases a quiet exhale, and turns over onto his back and then onto his side so that they’re lying face-to-face with only a small space between them. Will touches Hannibal’s waist with two fingers, and Hannibal inches forward until their chests line up and Will can feel Hannibal’s heartbeat again.

“You don’t ever have to talk about anything you don’t want to,” Will murmurs into Hannibal’s shoulder. Hannibal snuffles against his hair in response. “If you ever do want to talk about it, you can; whatever it is, Hannibal, you can tell me.”

After a long beat Hannibal says, “I know I can. Will?”

“Hmm?”

He feels Hannibal tap his chin against the top of his head before lying his cheek flat against his temple.

“I love you.”

Will smiles, brushing his lips against Hannibal’s cheek so that he’ll feel it before he sees it or hears it in Will’s reply: “I love you.”

Hannibal’s arms tighten around him. Will hums “Georgia On My Mind” out of order and probably out of tune until the arms around him slacken and the chest moving against his sinks into an irregular, sometimes too fast rhythm. Hannibal’s sleep isn’t fitful this time. Will glances up at his face once and finds his mouth in a loose, relaxed line. Only when he’s certain Hannibal is comfortable and at a place where he feels safe does Will allow himself to likewise succumb to sleep, nothing else on his mind but the sturdy feel of Hannibal’s body next to his and the image of moonlight shining through a wilderness of pine trees.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Handel-Halvorsen _Passacaglia_  
>  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNsxXued784
> 
> Camille Saint-Saëns _Danse macabre_  
>  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7kLBXrAsrU
> 
> Antonio Vivaldi _Winter_ from _The Four Seasons_  
>  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGMHCfiphNw
> 
> Vittorio Monti _Czardas_  
>  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yf1Byxg82-o
> 
> Chicken Marbella  
> http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/chicken_marbella/
> 
> From Ray Charles’ “Georgia On My Mind”: “I said Georgia, Georgia / A song of you (a song of you) / Comes as sweet and clear / As moonlight through the pines.”


	27. Don’t Stop

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will and Hannibal’s last day before the second half of the tour picks up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Ah, honey / I’m losing you / I know your heart is miles away / There’s a whisper there where once there was a storm_

Hannibal’s distant after they see Mason at Margot and Elise’s house. He doesn’t mean to be, but he is and things are strange as a result. It’s almost as if he’s going through mood swings. Will doesn’t know how to fix the gap that’s started to surge up between them. He attempts to bring it up a few times, but Hannibal’s evasive. Their last morning in together, they’ve stayed the night at Hannibal’s house.

Will wakes to find Hannibal toying quietly with the theremin on the other side of the room. The quiet, lilting notes don’t sound like any song Will knows. Of course, he can compare it to other pieces stored in his memory, but the piece of music in and of itself is an unheard tune from Will’s perspective. He waits unmoving on his side of Hannibal’s bed and breathes in Hannibal’s scent on the pillows and in the sheets. Across from the bed in the hallway, Will can see the corner of a suit of armor through the opened door. He wonders if it was a gift from Hannibal’s aunt or if Hannibal started his own collection based on what he experienced growing up.

Hannibal’s fingers tremble against the theremin’s invisible strings, caressing silence into song with sweeping gestures of his hand. He’s careful. His rhythm never stutters nor do his notes ever fall out of step. Will doesn’t listen for errors, but he’s had years of training and years of intuition before the training kicked in to spot missteps in scales and off-key notes here and there.

If it’s a song Hannibal wrote, he’s memorized it intimately. The impulse of each position and inflection has buried itself in his muscle memory like a reflex. Will listens to the rise and fall along what sounds like the pentatonic scale. He waits for the eerie undertone to lift, but it doesn’t. The patient melody speaks of wounds. It speaks of agony long left to the sidelines. One of his building notes shocks accidentally into a higher pitch, and the jolt in volume startles Hannibal away from his focus. He freezes, drops his hands fluidly into his lap, and rubs his palms on his thighs, listening just as Will is listening.

“Good morning, Will.”

“Morning.”

“I hope I didn’t wake you.”

“I think the bed being empty woke me,” he says as he pushes himself to sit up.

Hannibal swivels around to look at him and nods once, his expression closed off in a way that makes Will’s chest tighten painfully. They stare at each other and the quiet left in the aftermath of Hannibal’s music rings in Will’s ears like tinny bells.

Will swings his legs over the edge of the bed and walks around to Hannibal’s front. He stays seated but looks up at Will once he’s standing in front of him. With a tiny push in either direction, his knees slide apart to allow Will room in between his legs. For a moment, the room feels stifled for lack of breathable air, but in the next moment Hannibal buries his face in Will’s stomach and holds on without a word.

He makes a humming sound at the feel of Will’s fingers in his hair but still doesn’t say anything. Will doesn’t know what to do.

“You’re leaving tonight.”

“Yes.”

They breathe and hold on. Will wonders if it will always feel like this—if the most they’ll ever be able to do is hold on, if they’ll ever be sturdier than this. He thought they _were_ , but something went wrong.

“Is there anything special you want to do?” Will amends his question a second later: “Is there anything you want me to do?”

“Actually,” Hannibal says, leaning back far enough to look at Will, fingers still rubbing circles into his back. “I thought I might spend the day with my sister. She complains that you’ve replaced her.”

His voice is quiet and warm, but there’s still a very real defensive tone beneath the teasing. They’re both honest—they’re just two sides of Hannibal that, he’s right, have currently been prioritizing Will over Mischa. Will feels immediately guilty, but also unfairly suspicious that Hannibal just doesn’t want to be around him anymore because of whatever it is that’s been bothering him this last week. He dismisses that suspicion as clinginess, cringing away from it as soon as the feeling passes, which of course it does.

“Okay,” Will replies. “That’s fair.”

He says so because it is fair. It would be selfish and immature of him to deny Hannibal this time with his sister. They’ve seen each other a little bit at Will’s house and at her house for dinner when the siblings cooked together, but they haven’t exactly gotten a chance to hang out as brother and sister, uninterrupted. Will won’t let his own insecurities about their relationship prevent them from taking this day for each other.

“But for the record,” he says, maybe just to be contrary or maybe to deflect, “I have _not_ replaced her. Our roles in your life are very, very different.”

Hannibal smiles—at Will’s petulance or at the comment itself, he isn’t sure—and it’s the first full-on, unguarded smile he’s received from Hannibal in days. It lights up his face and makes him look young and gorgeous and hopeful in a way he somehow hasn’t lately. Will kisses him, and after a few seconds Hannibal reciprocates. 

Will takes his time feeling and re-mapping the contours and textures of Hannibal’s lips against his, soft and warm and yielding when Will pushes into him a little bit more. Hannibal makes a very soft noise and presses back. His mouth edges open when Will kisses him again, but Will keeps his kisses purposefully chaste, lifting his hands to rove feather light over Hannibal’s arms and his shoulders. He smoothes one palm gently up Hannibal’s throat so that his fingertips graze the point of Hannibal’s chin and his head tips back to break their kiss.

Eyes hooded and lips red and parted, Hannibal blinks up at Will, clearly struggling to think around whatever daze Will has rendered him into. When he doesn’t make any move to speak, Will keeps his hand planted delicately on Hannibal’s throat and leans over him to nip at the lips left exposed to him.

“Am I still taking you to the airport?” Will mumbles into Hannibal’s cheek.

Hannibal rumbles something unintelligible, clears his throat, and tries again: “Yes, please.”

Will nods and lets his hand slip down to Hannibal’s chest to cover his heartbeat. It’s slow, steady, and strong. Will didn’t expect anything else, but he’s still thrillingly infatuated with the halfway delirious murmuring he gets out of Hannibal when he speaks. He kisses the pulse in Hannibal’s neck.

“Should I come get you, or will your sister bring you?”

“I’ll ask her to drive me.”

“If you’re sure.”

“I am,” Hannibal mumbles, leaning away when Will’s hands dip down below Hannibal’s stomach. “I need to shower.”

It’s like ice water dumped on his head. Will takes his hands back and straightens out, moving too fast, in all likelihood, for the gesture to seem even remotely relaxed. He doesn’t try to make an excuse—just lets the wiring in his brain screaming for escape take over and says, “I’m going to go, I think.”

“Oh.”

The way the word is almost a question kills Will, but he holds onto his resolve. Hannibal clearly wants his space—has clearly wanted it for the past few days and Will was just too dense to realize it. 

“Yeah, I’ll see you tonight. Tell Mischa hi for me?”

“Yes, of course.”

Will bends down for another kiss, and it lasts a big longer than he intended He feels Hannibal’s hands land on his shoulder and pulls back, not wanting to make him uncomfortable.

He gets dressed and leaves before Hannibal’s gotten up from his spot to head for the bathroom. The disappointment churning in his gut is his own doing. Hannibal deserves to take time alone or with Mischa to recover. Being around Will probably only makes things worse since Will’s the reason Margot’s brother is, at least peripherally, back in Hannibal’s life. Will doesn’t even know the extent of Hannibal’s not-relationship with Mason Verger.

The small voice in the back of his mind tells him he would know if Hannibal told him, but Hannibal hasn’t told him. And that’s not Hannibal’s fault either that he’s not ready to volunteer anything beyond what he’d said at Margot’s. It’s not anyone’s fault, except maybe Mason Verger’s.

Will calls Peter after he’s been home alone for an hour sitting on the couch doing nothing. The dogs are scattered in piles around him, dozing and sniffing. It’s comfortable, but boring. He’s anxious after the way he left things with Hannibal this morning and he wants to be up and on his feet, doing things. He and Peter exchanged numbers before rehearsal one day after Clark had already driven off while people were still shuffling into the room taking their seats. They hadn’t intended to be sneaky about it, but even Peter acknowledged that Clark wouldn’t react positively if they traded contact information right in front of him.

“Hi, Will.”

“Hey, I was wondering if you were still looking for strings.”

They go to Tobias’ shop in Baltimore, which is a drive but not an unpleasant one. Peter directs Will to a bluegrass radio station, which is an unexpected and quaint surprise, and makes casual conversation on the road. Tobias likes Peter immediately once he finds out they share a common instrument between them.

“Can you believe this one? A viola,” Tobias ribs when Will turns his back.

“I can hear you,” Will grumbles without turning around.

He hears Peter laugh and say, modestly, “Well, to each his own.”

Tobias hovers noticeably within reach, but he doesn’t help unless Peter outright asks for assistance. Sometime in between Peter making up his mind about steel-core strings by Pirastro and moving toward a few pricy bows on display atop a mantel, another customer walks in through the door. Will sees Tobias start toward that way only to stutter briefly before continuing and greeting, in his smooth, deep voice, “Mr. Froidevaux, back again, I see.”

“Well, nobody quite knows the ins and outs of my nephew’s bass better than you do, Tobias.”

“What happened?” Tobias sounds amused. “Did he break a string again?”

“Oh, nothing so theatrical. He’s just decided it’s time to upgrade from his five eighths to a full size.”

“I did tell you the transition to adult sizes from a quarter size would go over fine without the half and five eighths sizes.”

“You did, yes, and you clearly know best, Tobias.”

Will tunes out the rest of their conversation when it becomes clear to him, at least, that this new customer is flirting—or attempting to flirt—with Tobias. He can’t tell based on Tobias’ always professional attitude and official demeanor whether he appreciates the efforts.

Peter is plenty concentrated on the cello bow in his hands for the moment, so Will lets himself relax. He didn’t realize, but he’s been wound up like a top since he left Hannibal’s house. He supposes he chose to distract himself with Peter’s company because of his assumption that Peter wouldn’t notice him frowning and make him talk about it.

He finds out just how wildly incorrect he was when Peter sets the bow back carefully and asks, “Is everything all right?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Will asks after a confused few seconds of silence.

“You sound sort of…stiff.”

“You can hear that?”

“All people can hear that. It’s just hard to name it when you don’t need it.”

Will swallows down his first two replies that don’t actually answer Peter’s first question.

“Going through something in my relationship.”

“Oh,” Peter half-mumbles, sounding embarrassed. “Oh, I’m sorry.”

“Did you think I was…?” Will stops. He doesn’t want to finish that question. It doesn’t even warrant being asked. “I offered to come here with you. It’s not an imposition.”

“No, of course not,” he says, the words coming a bit too hurriedly. He huffs a terse laugh.

For the first time since he’s known him, Will doesn’t believe him.

“Peter?”

“Let’s just pay for these and go,” he answers in a tight voice, confidently leading the way for both of them. The Chromcor strings in one hand and his white cane in the other.

Tobias sees them coming and promptly disengages himself from the other customer in the store where they’re talking over upright basses. Will gets a look at him from Peter’s side at the register. He’s small of stature but well-groomed and of a pleasant enough demeanor. He also has a beard, which Will only finds noteworthy because the last time Tobias displayed an interest in another customer where Will saw it, the guy was also bearded—although considerably taller.

But everyone has a type. He shouldn’t spare Tobias one of his own.

Peter walks out ahead of Will into the parking lot and waits until Will unlocks the door to quietly get in. He doesn’t offer anything once Will’s seated and buckling up. Will shuffles around needlessly for a bit before starting the car.

“Are things okay with Clark?” he asks in time with the engine.

“I’m not sure.”

“What about you? Are you okay?”

“Yeah, right as rain.”

They drive a little bit farther, closing the distance between Tobias’ shop and Peter’s house.

“If that changes, I hope you’ll tell someone, and if I need to shut up at any point in time—”

“I’ll tell you,” Peter promises.

Will smiles, looking away and at the road when Peter also smiles. He can probably hear Will’s smile just like he can sense shifts in mood; that, or he smiles when he feels like it regardless of what other people feel or don’t feel.

“Clark’s not a bad guy,” Peter assures him when they stop at Peter’s place. “I think we’re just…maybe not compatible anymore.”

“Does he know that?”

“If he doesn’t know it, he feels it. I can tell by the way he’s been acting that he feels it.”

Will’s heart sinks. His hands sweat against the steering wheel, and he doesn’t drive home until Peter’s long gone inside and locked up. He plays the radio loud and leaves the windows rolled down to allow every possible auditory stimulus to clutter his brain and dull the edge to his thoughts.

Abigail told him before he left for Hannibal’s last night that she’d be working most of the day and wouldn’t be home to see him off. They’d said goodbye yesterday. He feeds the dogs once he’s inside and wonders if it wouldn’t have been better if he’d said goodbye yesterday as well. After today they’ll have another two months apart. If he squints, it could be a good thing. If he doesn’t squint, well, it could still be a good thing.

He hears the doorbell from the backyard and walks around the house to peer around at his visitor without going to the door. His shoulders relax and he walks up to greet Margot.

“Hey, what are you doing here?”

“I just wanted to check in,” she answers, stepping down from the porch when he draws closer. “Is anyone else around?”

“No, it’s just me. Hannibal’s with his sister. Abigail’s at work.” He kisses her cheek and gestures for her to come inside. “Are you hungry? I can fix something.”

Will hasn’t eaten. Margot politely refuses. He’s not particularly hungry anyway.

“I actually wanted to talk to you about my brother.”

He says, “Ah.”

They sit down in the living room. Will takes an armchair. She takes the end of the couch and holds out an entertained hand to Penelope, Winston, and Buster when they come to investigate her person.

“Elise informed me that I’ve been avoiding you since Hannibal’s previous relationship with Mason came to light, and that wasn’t my intention. I know he leaves tonight, but I was hoping that we could try dinner again after he comes home in December. If he doesn’t want to, I’ll understand. Elise told me he reacted worse to Mason being there that night than I did.”

“There were a lot of factors to consider—one of those being whether we would ever be able to go back. He likes you a lot, you and Elise.”

_And Barney,_ he doesn’t say. It’d be a low blow.

“We like him, too. It’s not that we don’t. It’s just…things feel different now, even if I know rationally that they shouldn’t.”

“Yeah,” Will agrees, thinking about other things. “Yeah, I understand.”

“Anyway, um, he hasn’t shown up at our house since that night, and I just wanted to check with you to make sure he hadn’t tried coming here or to Hannibal’s.”

Will sits up straighter in his seat.

“Jesus, no. You think he’d come here?” 

“It’s not hard to find out where you live,” she says slowly. “You’ve been in the news lately, and I’m sure Mason knows where Hannibal lives.”

Madeline jumps onto the couch next to Margot and paws at her leg. Will watches Margot huff a laugh and pull the small dog onto her lap.

“We always had pets growing up,” she says softly without looking up from her hands that are currently ruffling Madeline’s ears. “But bigger ones, usually—horses, and the pigs.”

“Harder to get attached to the pigs, I’m guessing?”

They’ve talked about the Verger Dynasty before, so she doesn’t have to explain to him under what conditions they’d kept various animals. They rode the horses and killed the pigs. 

“I would, sometimes. It always ended badly, for the obvious reason.” Margot glances up at him. “Our father took a lot of pride in teaching us all about the family business, but Mason was the one who took to it. That kind of thing was easier for him than it is for me.”

“What do you mean, like he didn’t like the animals?”

“No, just…they were animals to him. He didn’t think of them as living beings so much as expendable things. When they were slaughtered it wasn’t a big deal to him. From the very beginning, he liked to go out and see them. It was like it fascinated him. I don’t doubt that it did.”

She shrugs to hide a shiver and looks away.

“We got older. He didn’t just become a compassionate person capable of mercy and kindness overnight. I don’t know if he ever did. It was like he started applying what he thought of the pigs to people—as though everyone else was beneath him, for whatever reason. He could be…really scary when we were growing up. Sometimes that manifested as violence, but usually it was just threats, sometimes subtler than even that.”

Will nods at the description. He’d felt it when he saw Mason for the first time in Barney’s room.

“He had an aggressive personality.”

“Yes.”

“Did he ever…hurt you?”

Margot sighs, “Sometimes. I got away from him as soon as I was able. He lives on the estate still with our father. He’ll die soon and the company will go to Mason, but even if he gets me written out of the will, I have Elise and Barney. I don’t need them or their money anymore.”

Will nods, confirming something for himself silently while Margot rubs Madeline’s belly. She looks fine, by all accounts. She _feels_ peaceful and warm, lounging in his living room with Madeline rolling around in her lap. The small white dog yawns wide and shakes her head, showing off her under bite at an angle. She smells like she needs a bath, but Margot doesn’t say anything. It’s probably a good time to bathe all the dogs before the fall weather trickles into winter.

“Is he okay?” she asks after a while.

“Hannibal?”

She nods.

“Something’s bothering him, but I don’t know what. He won’t talk to me about it.”

“I’m sorry.”

She sounds actually sorry, and he hates to have done that to her. He says, “You don’t have anything to be sorry about. Hannibal reacted just like you did. Something hurt you, and you needed to take a step back. You’re human.”

_Hannibal’s human._

Even more, he starts to believe that time apart will be good for them. It will give Hannibal a chance to sort through all of this resurfacing in his life without Will there watching his every move. Will can’t help but feel like the more he tries to help and make himself available, the less Hannibal can actually tolerate his efforts. Space can solve that. Music and crowds and ample distraction can solve that.

_Right?_

“Don’t worry about us, Margot. You just take care of your family. I’ll take care of mine.”

Margot smiles small at him. “Is he going to be a while? I can wait.”

“That’d be nice. He’ll like to see you.”

_Instead of me,_ Will doesn’t add because he’s definitely not bitter about it. He sends Mischa and Hannibal a text letting them know she’s here.

True to form, Hannibal is happy to see Margot when Mischa brings him two hours before he needs to be at the airport. Mischa is also happy to see Margot. Will slips away to the kitchen to throw a sandwich together while the three of them speak excitedly amongst themselves. He’s actually shocked his rumbling stomach didn’t give him away. To be fair, he can tell they didn’t expect to take to talking like they did. Better to discover they’re happy to be reunited than to be awkward. 

About three ravenous bites into the simply made cold cut, he feels eyes on the back of his neck and turns. Mischa smiles at him with one shoulder leaned against the doorframe.

“You’ve got mustard on you.”

Will swipes gruffly at his face and belatedly grabs a napkin. Mischa ventures further into the kitchen with him and he alerts to how quiet the house has become.

“Miff ey—” He swallows his food and clears his throat before trying again. “Did they go outside?”

“They’re on the porch.” Mischa nods her head once. “They’ve got a few things to talk about.”

Will nods back, understanding. “I got the feeling they did. Do you want a sandwich?”

“Could I have one to-go,” she asks with a cheerful smile, turning to sit on one of the cleared countertops. “That is, if you’ve still got roast beef in the fridge.”

“That I do.”

Mischa beams at him and watches him assemble various items from the fridge that he put away only a few minutes ago. He sets about silently preparing her sandwich, holding up various things to check if she wants them and setting them apart when she doesn’t. He tucks the finished roast beef on wheat into a transparent baggie and hands it off. 

“You’re being very patient with all this,” she tells him.

“Am I?” he asks legitimately concerned that he might have just missed her sarcasm.

She gives him a fondly exasperated look. “Yes, Will.”

Well, that’s news. And here he’d felt like the embodiment of impatience.

“I felt like I did everything wrong this morning, and these past few days…”

“He just needs some space with it, for now.”

“Well, he can have that in spades after tonight,” he mumbles offhandedly, returning to his sandwich.

“You think he considers being on tour the same thing as having space?” she asks him, amused but a touch critical. “Maybe you consider conducting for the orchestra time to yourself, or perhaps all those people disrupt your calm if they aren’t the direct cause of it. How many people are there in the orchestra you lead, Will? Ninety, if that?”

He opens his mouth to reply, but there aren’t words. She’s right.

“Could you imagine a thousand, or even the hundreds who will see you in January? Could you imagine a new set of them every few days, speaking different languages in different parts of the world?”

Her critical edge has receded, but her words still hit home. Will’s been hoping that a return to work would help Hannibal turn his focus away from the past and back to the present. He thought time away from _him_ —from Will—would provide the needed balm.

Mischa seems to grasp hold of his logic the moment he reasons it out in his head because she tilts her head to one side the same way her brother often does and murmurs, “Oh, Will.”

He steels himself and asks, “Am I wrong?”

“Yes, you beautiful idiot.”

She doesn’t elaborate beyond that point. The front door opens, and Hannibal and Margot make their way into the kitchen. Margot’s eyes are red and Hannibal’s cheeks flushed, but they don’t fall apart and they won’t. They’re supported from all sides. They have to know they are.

“Sandwiches?” Mischa offers in Will’s place.

“There’s salad, too. I can make something more substantial if neither of those sounds appealing.”

“I’ve got Elise at home. Last I heard she was making dinner,” Margot says, brightening a little at the prospect. “I think I’m gonna head back and see about that.”

“I’ll see you out,” Mischa supplies, speaking up before Will can get his thoughts in order, yet again. “I’m going that way anyway.”

Margot comes to give him a hug and touches Hannibal’s arm as she’s on her way out. Mischa gives Will a kiss on the cheek and hugs Hannibal tightly. She gives him a look over her shoulder, and Will ignores the exchange to make Hannibal a sandwich. He figures it’s a safe enough bet that he can throw together a sandwich Hannibal will like since he’s seen his cooking and fed him enough in turn to have a proper idea.

“Will?”

He hums in response.

“I don’t like mustard.”

Will nearly laughs in desperation.

“Okay.”

“We should talk before we leave.”

“Is that what you want?” Will asks, discarded the piece of bread and the lettuce stuck to it. “Do you even want a sandwich, or is this useless as an olive branch?”

“Why would you need to give me an olive branch?”

“Look, don’t do that, all right? This morning was weird. I was weird, and I feel weird now trying to explain it. Things just feel off right now.”

“Margot said something similar,” Hannibal murmurs, stopping Will’s hands when he starts to fumble out another piece of bread for the doomed sandwich. “Will, just stop a moment.”

Will presses his lips together and does as he’s told. His breath comes too fast.

“What?”

Hannibal watches him for a moment before dropping his eyes. Like it pains him to say the words aloud, he says, “I haven’t known how to appropriately behave myself around you since everything transpired at Margot’s home. You didn’t want me to initiate sex, so I didn’t; you didn’t ask me to explain my relationship with Mason, so I didn’t.”

Will stops him.

“I thought if you wanted to talk about him, you would have. I didn’t want to pressure you into sharing that with me if you weren’t ready. You said it brought back memories of…”

“Grutas,” Hannibal answers gruffly, standing farther away than Will is comfortable with.

“Grutas,” Will confirms, wanting to show that he isn’t afraid or ashamed of the name because he hopes Hannibal isn’t afraid or ashamed of it. “And I didn’t mean that we couldn’t ever have sex again—just that when you’re in a bad place emotionally, it doesn’t feel right. It’s happened a few times now. You did it when we got back from the airport and you did it after Mason. It didn’t even seem like you wanted it, Hannibal. What did you expect me to do?”

“I thought…” He falters like he expects Will to interrupt him and shrugs helplessly when Will makes no move to do so. “I thought it would feel better.”

“Hannibal,” Will hears himself saying, to no real end except to steady him, and it’s then that he thinks he understands why Hannibal is confused by the boundary he tried to draw. He hazards a slow step forward and doesn’t miss the tension that builds in Hannibal’s shoulders when he starts to angle himself away. Will did that. He caused the unnecessary strain between them. “Can I touch you?”

He waits until Hannibal nods and says yes. Hannibal’s rigid at first, straight-backed and radiating that kind of discomfort Peter must have picked up on when he said Will was ‘stiff’. As soon as Will’s got hands on him, though, that changes. For a few seconds he’s still and unmoved. It doesn’t take long for Hannibal to absolutely melt into him. Will has a thought of how wrong it is to be excited by the way Hannibal responds to his body, but it’s goddamn intoxicating after feeling like an unwanted weight in Hannibal’s world for just one day.

“But this morning?” Will asks, half the question he means to ask really there.

“I haven’t been myself. I didn’t know if you would consider sex a ‘coping mechanism’.”

Will sighs regretfully at his own words coming from Hannibal’s mouth—yet more proof that he’s the saboteur of the pair of them. He turns abruptly to kiss Hannibal’s cheek, apologetic.

“For future reference, I only meant that if you’re obviously torn up about something to the point of not wanting me to touch you, you don’t have to force it. I only want that if you actually want it, too, okay?”

Hannibal moves his hands along Will’s back, feeling where he hasn’t let himself over the past few days. They sunk a long way in a short time. It’s one more reminder at how little experience they have trying to make their relationship work long-term. It makes Will afraid, if only a little bit, of what happens come December. He used to worry they wouldn’t last until then, but that’s not his concern anymore. Afterward, when there are no distractions left to keep them apart, it’ll be just them and a whole lot of time stretching out ahead of them.

It should be invigorating. Sometimes it is, if he’s being honest with himself. He likes the thought of having a future with Hannibal that’s about life together rather than experiences apart with stolen time in between. He loves the thought of sharing their time with significantly less traveling and maybe fewer commutes between their homes (one day). Even introducing their friends and enduring hours of teasing and jokes has become a highly desired thing in Will’s mind. He looks forward to it; he wants it with all of his being, and fair enough, he shouldn’t get so down on himself every time there’s trouble in paradise.

They’re new at this. He’s learning more and more that they’re both making it up as they go along, and as often as the revelation comforts him, it panics him. Will’s told him bits and pieces of this on various occasions, but for the moment he holds it to his chest, wanting to look at it some more by himself before dumping it on Hannibal in clumsy half-realized ideas.

He’d thought that perhaps Hannibal might want that option with Mason, but apparently his intention had been lost completely. They’ll talk about it one of these nights on the phone after the rift of continents has jarred their time zones hours apart once more.

It feels unreal to have that thought. He used to think of the world coming between them as a barrier, and now it feels like a buffer or a…

A crutch?

_Oh, no._

“I understand,” Hannibal tells him.

“No you don’t,” Will mumbles without heat, having forgotten their conversation up until this point because his train of thought has gone so horribly off the rails.

“What?”

Hannibal’s voice is also without heat, thank God. He only sounds confused, and rightfully so, Jesus.

“I mean…” Will blinks. Should they get into it now? Is there time? He closes his eyes and holds his hand there as if to block the light completely. “No, I just mean…”

“What is it?”

He drops his hands to his sides and forces himself to look at Hannibal.

“I need you.”

It comes out strangled and oddly startled, and Hannibal is accordingly bewildered. 

“As I need you,” he replies without a question mark in sight.

Will sighs and shakes his head, dares to take a step closer, and loses his breath when Hannibal’s eyes drop instantly to his lips. This is what he needs. He needs to let go and remember what he felt in the beginning when having Hannibal in arm’s reach like he does now made his skin feel like it was on fire. He needs _Hannibal’s_ need burning him back.

“No, I mean that I need you.”

He licks his lips and presses himself up against Hannibal’s front and kisses him firmly without further ado, letting a moan slip when Hannibal’s mouth flowers open to him like it did that morning. He starts to kiss back and dig his fingers into Will’s shoulders and down his back, but Will steps easily out of his hold toward the hallway, turning and walking backwards so he can watch Hannibal pursue him. He doesn’t need to say anything to persuade him, judging from the dark look in Hannibal’s eyes, so he satisfies himself with a smirk just before disappearing into the hallway and bolting for his bedroom.

Hannibal’s not far behind. He’s gasping when he kisses Will again—when he catches him around the waist and pushes him down onto the bed. He mutters something into Will’s throat and bites him and peels the shirt and trousers off of his body, leaving butterfly kisses wherever his hands linger. Will pulls the shirt off Hannibal’s back when it’s his turn and watches him shuffle out of the rest of his clothes, deeply fascinated at the undulations of his shoulder blades and his hips.

While he’s distracted brushing their clothes off the bed, Will scrambles through the bedside table, forgetting for a long four seconds where he keeps the lube until he finds it. Hannibal must have been waiting and watching because he yanks Will down once he’s secured it in his hand. He doesn’t search for a condom, but that’s deliberate and might backfire on him depending on how Hannibal feels about a mess after and whether they’ll have time to accommodate for one on their schedule. They have a little over an hour and they’ve done more with less, so really, what they have now is actually generous, considering.

He loses track of his reasoning at the first graze of Hannibal’s teeth against his inner thigh. The first bit of pressure between his cheeks rouses him. Apparently Hannibal was warming the stuff up for him while Will was plotting. He’s grateful. The slide and roiling friction of the one knuckle tucked up inside him loosens his shoulders where they’re bunched slightly against the pillows. He writhes against them for a moment and then flings them out to the side, accidentally swiping Hannibal with the fluffy end of one and laughing at the look on his face. Half his hair twisted up in silent response.

Hannibal holds his eyes and pushes the rest of his finger into him in one fluid motion, and Will’s laugh chokes off into a breathless sigh. He drops his head back and blinks at the ceiling. His body is relaxed enough around the intrusion that it hadn’t hurt to take the full girth and length of his finger, but he can still feel himself stretching, burning around that finger. When it moves out and then plunges back in all the way, he lifts his head to look up at Hannibal, wondering if he’ll search out his prostate like he does when Will’s body opens to him so easily.

But perhaps he’s punished for leaving in such a stir this morning because Hannibal dutifully stays away from the spot inside him. His fingers keep moving, spearing him open wide around two fingers and keeping him there until his erection flags. Not a moment too soon, he wraps his free hand around Will’s cock and pumps him smoothly, patiently beyond the point of full hardness. He feels himself straining and groaning and reaching for Hannibal’s hair and his shoulders when two things happen at once: Hannibal augments the stretch to three fingers, and Hannibal sucks Will’s cock into his mouth.

Will valiantly attempts a word, but he mostly only gets the beginnings of consonants before they pinch into moans and variations of Hannibal’s name. It’s the only word he can get through before his body betrays him and sends little shockwaves of pleasure up his spine.

Hannibal chooses that moment to sink his fingers in and rub. Will’s world tilts with the arch of his back. The moan that breaks out of his throat sounds like thunder in his ears.

“Oh my God, stop,” he begs, flailing with one hand to tug recklessly at Hannibal’s hair. He looks, to Will’s credit, just as decadently unraveled as Will feels. His own voice is gravel as he says, _demands_ , “Come up here and fuck me.”

The answering hum he gets for that is so hungry and pleased that Will feels himself turning over before he knows it’s what he wants, but it is. He expects to have to explain it to Hannibal for all of a few seconds until he feels himself mounted—quite eagerly—and bitten rapturously on the shoulder, the side of his neck, and the cartilage of his ear.

“You didn’t give me a condom,” Hannibal accuses into his ear, wrapping one strong arm around Will’s middle that plasters them together, chest to back.

“I don’t want one.”

Just like that, Hannibal is spreading one of his cheeks with his free hand and nudging against Will where he’s dripping the proof of Hannibal’s preparation. His own cock hangs heavy between his legs and he closes his fingers around the base, pulls up once, and then strokes down just to hold himself over. Hannibal’s quiet, looking at Will’s arm obviously tucked beneath him. Will moves his hand a few times for Hannibal’s benefit and gasps at the sharp burst of tension in his back when Hannibal presses into him.

He’s loose enough that the head passes through with little resistance, though it still wrenches and sparks in all of the best possible ways. Will’s shaking by the time Hannibal’s buried deep inside of him, as far as both their bodies allow. He waits a moment before pulling back and driving in again, hard. Will loses all semblance of finesse or restraint and sinks to his elbows, spreads his knees further apart, and throws his head back. He’s taking this. He’s taking all of it while he can.

Hannibal appears to agree. He unwinds his arm from Will’s midsection and plants both hands on Will’s hips before sitting back on his knees. Instead of slamming into him from behind, he pulls Will back onto him so that he sinks on his cock again and again. Will can tell he’s searching by the way he shifts irregularly, and once he finds it, every heated collision of their bodies is about that spot. It’s dizzying and Will struggles to hold himself up before finding the headboard with his hands and leveraging it to his advantage. His hands slip with sweat and Hannibal bites and sucks at his neck like he’ll stop breathing before he makes himself stop this. He needs it.

His cock is inside him, hot, full, and weeping like Will’s is in between his stomach and the bed. He’s leaving bruises on his hips, his shoulders, and his arms. Will doesn’t want him to stop, except he does, for just a moment.

“Switch,” he pants, pushing onto his hands and struggling to catch his breath when Hannibal eases out of him.

He turns, straddles Hannibal’s thighs, and brings them together again. Hannibal uses this position to kiss Will, and that’s so much better—it’s so much more sensation at once—that Will can feel his orgasm creeping up on him. It’s a claiming kiss. It’s deep and messy. Will sucks in a breath after a few too many seconds holding it behind clenched teeth. When he relaxes enough to take another gasping inhale, Hannibal plunders his mouth with his tongue.

His arms close around Will’s lower back so that their chests stick and slide with the even rollicking of their hips—pushing and pulling like a single engine working toward satiation. They pant into each other’s mouths, and Will can tell right before he comes that Hannibal’s not right behind him—that he isn’t through yet and that he’ll keep fucking him after he’s finished. Will, already riding the wave of his orgasm seconds before it crashes into him, absolutely loves the idea. In fact, if asked, he might say that the thought of it is what actually tips him over the precarious edge.

Hannibal slows his movements enough for them to be considered soothing, clutching Will to him through his single shout, through the hard full-body shudder that makes Hannibal groan into his neck, and through the tiny shivers Will gets after. His hands relax first, followed by his arms, which drop slowly, intentionally from around Hannibal’s neck and his arms before snaking down to the backs of his hands at Will’s back beneath his ribs but above his hips.

“Come on then,” he whispers.

He stares for as long as Hannibal watches his eyes and goes when he’s lowered gingerly onto his back. Hannibal rearranges Will’s legs around his waist and presses back into him. It’s a slick glide home now. He arches to meet Hannibal where their bodies meet and wraps his legs tightly around him to urge him on harder, closer. The buzzing effect of his orgasm still leaves him a bit stunned, but he can appreciate the way Hannibal looks holding himself over Will’s body and letting his eyes fall closed when it feels especially good.

Will’s body isn’t too sensitive yet to complain about this and even if it were, Hannibal is gentle with him. He rolls his hips and mouths up Will’s jawline to his temple and dives back down to take his lips in a kiss that he breaks only when his rhythm starts to stutter.

“Will,” he says at the end of a fractured moan.

He keeps himself wrapped around Hannibal until he settles, not unlike a spider monkey, and lets his limbs fall to the mattress when he pulls out. Briefly he thinks it was a mistake to not use a condom, but Hannibal surprises him by rubbing two fingers against his oversensitive rim, probably rubbed raw and—yeah, Will can feel it—trickling slowly with spunk and lube. His body jerks at Hannibal’s curiosity and he mumbles something vague before squirming out from under him to get something to staunch the—the…oh, hell, the _leakage_ , but Hannibal keeps him trapped with his legs in Hannibal’s lap.

“Really, you’re that fascinated by your handiwork?”

“Yes, it’s quite lovely.”

“You are officially the strangest man I have ever dated.”

But Hannibal laughs at him, and Will can’t help that he laughs in response. A roll in the hay is exactly what they needed to close this trip and mend the few things that amounted to little more than sexual frustration. There are a few things left to sort out, of course, but Will has no trouble believing, in the haze of their shared sex cloud, that they’ll face that hurdle when they get to it. 

“Oh, shit,” he mumbles, remembering why they were in such a hurry to do this. “What time is it?”

Hannibal leans back without surrendering his hold on Will’s knees to check the clock on the floor. Will must have knocked it over when he was looking for the lube.

“Just don’t fall asleep,” he says without a care in the world, except for that not being true at all because when Hannibal looks back, his expression is soft and his eyes are warm. For this moment and for however long they let it last, the clouds are distant. All he feels is light. “Stay with me. We’ll make it.”

Will blinks, heart swelling in his chest before he can think better of it and before Hannibal can add, as if he’d just forgotten to complete the sentence, “To the airport.”

The kiss he leans down to give Will makes him think it wasn’t an accident, but whether it was or not, Will finds that he needs to say, “I plan on it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chromcor strings by Piastro  
> http://www.johnsonstring.com/strings-types-steel-core.htm


	28. Moonlight Mile

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The second leg of the tour and the homecoming.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Oh I’m sleeping under strange, strange skies / Just another mad, mad day on the road / My dreams is fading down the railway line / I’m just about a moonlight mile down the road / I’m hiding sister and I’m dreaming_

Randall’s birthday in Kiev ends on a positive note with Randall endearingly drunk and Donald surprisingly less so steering them through their hotel lobby at three in the morning. Hannibal is one of the more sober members of their group, but that isn’t saying much. They’d relied on a taxi service to bring them back to base in one piece, and Randall looked thoroughly ecstatic, which was a lovely thing to see on his typically stoic, occasionally haunted face.

Donald has been capitalizing on Randall’s inebriation to ask him all about his ‘type’ concerning men. He is still set, apparently, on finding a match for Randall when they get home, and after half a dozen shots and an almost lighthearted bar fight had significantly lowered Randall’s walls, he was taking the window of opportunity to glean some insight into Randall’s preferences.

Bedelia steals Randall away from Donald’s clutches once they get to their rooms to try and get him down for bed or sober him up at the very least. She gives Donald a mildly judgmental look but doesn’t say anything.

“He said he doesn’t have a type. Can you believe that? Everyone’s got a type.”

Donald is soused enough that his words slur together. Hannibal is unsympathetic to his complaints, as are Bryn and Abel.

“Randall doesn’t have a type,” Bryn insists, holding an icy water bottle to her feverish forehead. “He barely registers physical attraction.”

“Wait, what does that mean?” Donald looks from Bryn to Hannibal and Abel, helplessly confused. “You said he came out as gay.”

“And he did,” Hannibal supplies. 

Abel coos, “Some people like to know a person before they fall into bed with them, Donald.”

“Then what kind of person does Randall like to get to know—disregarding all the stuff I asked him about.”

Bryn considers the modified question for a few seconds and says, “Well, it’d have to be someone who’s as into music as he is.”

“So Will,” Donald answers flatly.

“Okay,” Abel muses, noticing Hannibal’s narrowed eyes. “Maybe lower your standards a bit.”

“Wait a second! Will.” Donald’s eyes light up with an idea, and he exclaims, “We’re seeing his concert in January—his concert where there will be dozens of dedicated, skilled musicians just mulling about for the taking!”

Bryn snorts behind her hand. Abel chuckles and rubs his hand across his forehead.

“I am almost certain Will wouldn’t react with enthusiasm to this plan of yours,” Hannibal deadpans.

“It doesn’t have to be weird. We just bring Randall along, introduce him to people, and see if his curiosity sparks. Didn’t you say Will was interested in meeting Randall anyway? He likes live music. It won’t be hard to convince him to go.”

“That’s a valid point,” Bryn replies evenly, though her eyes also narrow with suspicion. “Why is this so important to you anyway? Randall doesn’t need to be in a relationship to be happy.”

“Randall doesn’t need a lot of things to be happy,” Abel chimes in. “The man’s more well-adjusted than most people _I’ve_ met. He’s certainly got his head on his shoulders in a better way than any of us.”

Donald sighs, a sign of his frustration perhaps. He sits down next to Hannibal on the couch.

“Just…what happens to this when we aren’t off touring anymore? When we aren’t thrown into each other’s paths for recording sessions or gigs?”

“Donnie, don’t be so dramatic,” Bryn complains, throwing a couch pillow at his head. Hannibal catches it clumsily when it bounces off Donald’s ear toward his face. “You know this band is like a second family. You don’t stop being my weird big-brother figure just because I don’t see your face every day.”

“Why worry about Randall’s loneliness anyway? The Du Maurier family has adopted him in every way except on paper.”

“Donald has made it his mission to pair our Randall with a prince,” Hannibal answers for him when Donald takes a second too long to come up with a reply. “News of Ian’s second child has him feeling paternal.”

“Okay, so sue me,” Donald interjects in a loud voice. “But I didn’t even know he’s into men. I know an alarming amount of unimportant details about the lot of you from our misadventures on the road, yet I didn’t know this one very important thing about him. It’s the principle of the thing!”

Randall tiptoes back into their room at about 4:30 without Bedelia to proudly announce that she’s fallen asleep. Abel watches him with his cheek in hand and a disarmingly fond expression on his face. Bryn and Donald have fallen asleep as well, so Hannibal and Abel sit up with him until the sun rises, listening to his enchanting accounts of the dinosaurs that inhabited Europe millions of years ago.

He tells Hannibal in a small voice that he loves the drawing Hannibal gave him yesterday morning and laughs when Abel pretends to be affronted about his gift not earning a similar mention.

“I _do_ like your present, though, Abel. The best thing about this jacket is the little cartoon dinosaur patch sewn on the inside of this pocket.” He brandishes the aforementioned patch in the shape of a Triceratops. The jacket itself is stylish and expensive, black leather the likes of which Randall would never buy for himself but that he has no reservations about wearing. “I’m going to name her Cera.”

“A lovely name,” Hannibal reassures him. Abel snickers at him and Randall smiles indulgently.

“Did you ever get to the Kiev tradition?” Randall asks after a moment, setting the flap of his jacket down and tugging the funny hat on his head that Bedelia’s mother apparently made him. “We had the show on Friday, yesterday was my birthday, and we’re leaving for Vienna this afternoon.”

Hannibal looks at Abel, waiting for him to explain, which he does: “The Kiev tradition involves Chicken Kiev.”

Randall blinks and says, “What?”

To his credit, Randall doesn’t look perturbed about the Kiev tradition until they’re on the plane to Austria, and even then, he seems inclined not to speak of it. Also to his credit, Randall doesn’t back down from participating in the rest of their regional traditions, not at Linz where they find strange uses for fairy lights, not in Bucharest where Abel demonstrates his savvy as a tailor and makes fine smocks for them out of cheap cloth they buy in a nondescript shop, and not in Prague where they teach him to line dance—not even when Hannibal video calls Will at the last minute so he can watch (Prague being a five hours ahead of Wolf Trap, it’s one of the easier time differences they’ve had to navigate).

Hannibal buys chocolates for Mischa and Will in Turin and flax canvases for Abigail in Rome at DittaG. Poggi to go with her brush set from L’Eliografica. Halloween finds them in St. Petersburg, and they turn in late to their rooms to eat little wrapped chocolates Elliot bought them at Slavyanka while they were performing.

Will called before the show, so Hannibal texts him pictures of his ‘Romantika’ wrappers all pushed into a sad heap near his pillow. In the morning , Hannibal wakes to Will’s text: _You’re going to be chubby when you come home._

**_Increased weight can often signify an increased sense of security._ **

_That’s sweet of you. Must be from all those Russian candies you ate. ;P_

When the tour takes them back to Germany, Donald and Abel take the last train to Stuttgart on Saturday night to visit Ian after the show and return to Düsseldorf bright and early Monday morning for their flight to Slovakia. Abel brings back with him a drawing Kenny made of a frizzy lion dancing with a tired-looking moose. Donald comes back with Sophie’s ultrasound: _Twins, they said. Doesn’t that look more like a hump than a head? I tried to tell them they’re having a hunchback and not two babies at the same time._

But of course Abel tells them Donald said no such thing and that his reaction, actually, was a lot more tearful than flippant. They hadn’t needed Abel to tell them as much, but it’s heartwarming to get a fuller sense of the picture all the same.

At Piešťany, where they have no tradition to go with the town because it’s Nemean Lion’s first time playing there, they spend their three days of downtime at the Danubias Health Spa. Bryn demands that they cancel the rest of the tour and relocate permanently to Piešťany. It’s a tempting thought. Hannibal has a deep, newfound appreciation of mud, and while he’s never been particularly interested in sunbathing, he finds there’s something peaceful about the Slovakian sky, blue and open and vast.

He calls Mischa in between laps at the indoor pool and greets her laughingly.

“Sister mine!”

“Brother dearest! You sound positively radiant. What are you up to?”

“We’ve our off-days in Piešťany until the Japan shows. Bedelia insisted we spend them at the Danubias.”

“Please tell me you’ve taken advantage of their mud baths. Last time you agreed to go to a spa, you wouldn’t let them put the stuff on you.” She yawns. “It was intensely frustrating.”

“Yes, I tried it this time. I apologize for teasing you all those years for your love of mud. I still fail to understand why you enjoyed the taste of it so much, but its allure otherwise is quite well-deserved.”

“Children eat strange things, Hannibal, or have you forgotten of your great love affair with glue?”

Hannibal can only smile, guilty.

“One day I’ll find out how you know that about me.”

Mischa hums pleasantly, saying, “The same way I know anything about you, darling. I read your mind. How is everyone?”

“Enjoying the provisions, entertaining thoughts of mutiny.”

“Ah, like one does at a Slovakian spa. And Will?”

“Would you have me believe you haven’t seen him in my absence?” Hannibal teases.

“Oh, of course not,” she muses. “We both know he likes me more than he likes you.”

“Then you know how he is.”

“Well, _yes,_ but that’s not the point. I don’t ask him all about your relationship whenever I see him. His pack of hounds is of far more interest to me.”

“They are good dogs,” he cedes, too pleasant in the sunlight to argue or to take offense. “Will loves his dogs very much.”

“You should attend spas more frequently, Brother. They work wonders for your temperament.”

“What does that mean?”

“That you are a sour, accidentally amusing person and I enjoy you very much.”

“That is almost exactly what you say about grapefruit.”

“Is it? Don’t change the subject. I want to know if you’re all right. You were having problems last time you were in town.”

“Yes, and now I’m out of town again for another month. We don’t have issue with being on opposite ends of the globe.”

It takes Hannibal a moment to hear his sister’s epiphany in the short, terse silence, but once he does, he can’t deny that she knows what he’s suspected for some time now. Thankfully, she also appears to detect that he would rather not ruin his spa day with gloomy talk of the flaws in his and Will’s relationship. They had a tenuous beginning and an even rockier preamble: what would have been a one-night stand that had actually begun four years prior at a conference.

Hannibal tries not to think about it too closely. It’s not fair to do that when Will’s at a disadvantage and can’t catch him in it like he might if they weren’t thousands of miles away, separated by the Atlantic.

“Hannibal, I know I can be oversentimental for your tastes, but perhaps you need to hear this more often in light of recent events: you deserve for this relationship with Will to work.”

His mouth goes dry. He sits up on his reclined chair and swings his legs over the side to plant his feet solidly on the ground.

“Mischa.”

“No, hear me say this. Will is a good person. He is kind and generous and prone to losing himself in his imagination when his head and heart conflict. He has been wounded by life and understands the burden and joy of bringing a life not his own from the darkness into the light. He wants this to work every bit as much as you do, and you would be a fool to see what you have with him as less than what it is—to treat it as less than what it is.”

“Why do you suppose I would?” he asks quietly, curiously, unsure of whether he really wants to know.

“Brother,” she says slowly with compassion evident in her voice like it can be when she has a hard truth to relate to him. “You have blamed yourself long enough for your fallout with Mason. You had no idea he was Margot’s brother. You had no way of knowing that he would turn up at their home when you were there or that he would recognize you and make a scene.”

“After _I_ made a scene first, Mischa, lest we forget.”

“You don’t allow anyone to forget it! Nothing about your relationship with him was healthy, and I know you weren’t happy near the end of it. Things are going to be different with Will. It isn’t fair for you to have the same expectations of him that you were conditioned to have after Mason. You _know_ relationships aren’t all like that. I only met him the one time by accident, and do you remember what I said?”

As if he could forget.

“You said, ‘I don’t think that’s your best idea.’”

“And?”

Hannibal sighs.

“Will is a _very good_ idea, and you know it. He’s good for you, and you’re…moderately decent enough for him.”

He snorts in spite of his darkening mood.

“I mean, I really think he could easily nab someone at least ten years younger without a smoking habit, but he seems to like you, so.”

“Haven’t you heard?” Hannibal croons. “I’m quitting.”

“Are you! None of those delightful cherry-scented ones either?”

“I haven’t touched a cigarette since Lyon, nor have I felt the desire for one.”

“I’m impressed! That’s very good, Brother.”

“Thank you, and…I know you’re right, concerning what you said before. I won’t forget it.”

“I love you, Hannibal.”

“I love you, Mischa.”

The rest of their stay at Piešťany proves to be just as relaxing as it was in the beginning. They are well-rested and calm for the Friday show in Tokyo. After the Osaka show, Hannibal takes a train by himself to Hiroshima to visit Oba’s childhood friend, Jōtōmon-in. They plant an ume tree in the garden and drink tea on the porch in view of the sakura tree Hannibal planted in the yard when he was seventeen. The sun stays out all day with the next morning producing about five minutes of rain. 

Hannibal calls Oba as the sun is rising and describes to her the orange wash of dawn cutting through smog-blue clouds that only threaten a storm, the alabaster chimney smoke of her neighbors, trees sparsely populated with brambly limbs, and the wind whistling in the brass pipes Mischa hung on the porch ten summers ago. Oba listens quietly to his descriptions, thanks him just as quietly, and inquires as to his health and whether he’s happy.

The latter question takes him by surprise, but he answers truthfully—tells her he’s ready to come home but that he isn’t sure going home will make things better or worse. He tells her of Nemean Lion’s decision to withdraw from the public realm for at least a year, he tells her of his idea for a restaurant, he tells her about Will, he tells her how he’s quit smoking, he tells her of Ian and Sophie expecting twins…

Oba chuckles softly on the other line when he has to stop to catch his breath.

“The excitable boy that you were has become a man, I see.”

“Only just now?” Hannibal murmurs, bewildered as his mind continues to race at a speed unparalleled by his words. “Because I quit smoking?”

“Hannibal, all your life, your instinct has been to stand your ground and not to run, even when to stay meant to put your life in peril.” She pauses and he hears her sigh. “You return, for better or for worse. Coming home will simply bring you closer to what comes next, and whether it is good or bad, it will be home. It will be your home.”

Hannibal looks up at the Hiroshima sky, so like the other skies he’s seen in the past weeks but also intrinsically different. He wonders if it could be snowing in Virginia or if Mischa has succeeded at keeping the kittens, Harvey and Kačiukas, restricted to life indoors. He wonders if the gifts he bought have made it home safely to them: to Mischa in Baltimore and to Will and Abigail in Wolf Trap. He stares at the proud sakura tree that will likely outlive him if Jōtōmon-in has someone to tend to it and keep it from rotting.

Roots. Time. Wind chimes. Home.

Oba tells him she loves him and to be safe on the remainder of his trip. Jōtōmon-in sends him off with a small tin of amanattō that she made for the train ride back to Osaka. Hannibal listens to the Miles Davis songs Will snuck onto his iPod for the duration of the three-hour journey and walks back to the hotel inspired and cheerful.

They spend Thanksgiving in Australia with Bedelia managing to attract a rather handsome bellhop from the hotel who waits on her hand and foot. Bryn is supremely jealous and acts it, but only as a parody. However, Bryn starts to feel substantially better when a lifeguard at St. Kilda Beach takes an obvious shine to her. Even Abel, unshakeable Abel who as far as Hannibal knows has only ever been interested in Katya and Mischa, has to admit that the lifeguard—she says her name is Janice—is gorgeous.

As soon as the sun sets and casts a lovely darkness over the shore and waters of St. Kilda, Janice’s watch ends and she whisks Bryn off for drinks, supposedly. Donald wolf whistles as they leave, shameless being that he is. Bedelia looks prepared to scold him for his teasing, but the look on his face is one of genuine happiness and she opts not to say what Hannibal hoped she wouldn’t.

Bryn doesn’t tell them what happened with Janice when she returns the following _afternoon_ , but she looks neither distraught nor ecstatic. Hannibal takes that to be the best possible outcome given that they’ll be returning to the States very soon.

The final show in New Zealand finds them tired. Bryn complains very little but is obviously irritated to still be sharing space with them. Bedelia barely speaks except to Randall who also barely speaks, though that isn’t extraordinary by any means. Donald’s jokes are more heavily laden with sarcasm than light humor. Abel sighs and squints at everything. Hannibal craves a cigarette. Elliot and Martin pace a lot when they come to talk to them pre-show.

Everyone is on edge and ready to call it quits and go home, but they also want to give the very best performance that they can for the people who’ve come to see them tonight. It’s a mess.

They spend the morning and early afternoon leading up to the show fidgeting and wandering off by themselves to try and get a few minutes alone. Donald offers everybody cigarettes like the gesture somehow helps him let off steam, and the third time he offers one to Hannibal, Hannibal throws a vase at him, aiming roughly for center-mass and landing in the vicinity of his shoulder.

The screaming starts.

When it’s over, Hannibal doesn’t remember what’s been said, but he doesn’t think it’s an effect allotted to him alone. Donald looks confused and Bryn and Abel look mildly unnerved and Bedelia just leaves the room without saying anything. Hannibal leaves the room second and calls Will.

“It’s not the first time this has happened,” he explains lightly after Will’s gone through the typical exclamations. “Once he threw a candlestick at my face and broke my nose.”

“Is _that_ why you have scar?” Will remarks, clearly astonished.

“How did you think I came to have it?”

“I don’t know. I guess I was thinking you’d been in some nasty fight with mobsters or…maybe when you rescued Tianlu in Bristol, you had to fight some thugs to bring him back safely.”

Hannibal snorts at the mental image. All that had really happened was he walked up to Tian and scooped him up—stupid, probably, but he hadn’t snarled when Hannibal approached him and he looked more miserable than ferocious. Bedelia had frowned at the thought of dog hair on the jet, but otherwise, she was all for the idea of taking the dog back to Mischa. The rest of the band liked the idea, too. Mischa’s house was too big for her to stay in it alone when the five of them weren’t there to help her fill it.

Will laughs harder at Hannibal’s more precise explanation of the very real events that led to his broken nose.

“I remember it vividly. The candlestick was brass. I’m surprised he didn’t give me a concussion.”

“Oh my God. Did you go to the hospital?”

“Yes, unfortunately,” Hannibal murmurs, more amused now than he had been. “You know how I feel about places like that. Anyway, they set my nose and I was fine. I looked like I had been smacked with a tire iron, but I was fine.”

Will sputters on the other line and badly stifles a giggle.

“I’m sorry, that’s awful. It’s—it’s horrible.”

“It actually wasn’t as bad as all that. The second the candlestick left his hand, I could see that Donald regretted picking it up in the first place. As I replay that scene in my mind, the look of absolute horror on his face as he throws it only becomes funnier to me.”

“That’s one hell of a silver lining.”

“Brass, Will. The candlestick was brass.”

“I know, but—oh.” Will laughs again. It’s a lovely sound. Hannibal wants to hear it always. “Not that I condone throwing things at people, but I think a brass candlestick to the nose beats a ceramic vase to the shoulder.”

“I will inform Donald of your ruling.”

“Yeah, nothing to thin the tension than to remind him of the time he broke your nose on a candlestick. Wait, was it a single candlestick or a candelabra?”

“A single candlestick.”

“Oh, okay. Still a hell of a thing to take right in the face. Did you even try to block it?”

“I turned into it as a matter of fact.”

Will holds his tongue for a three-count. Hannibal can hear him trying not to laugh.

“It’s quite amusing to you to think that I would be done in by a candlestick, isn’t it?”

“No! No, it’s not, at all.”

“Will Graham.”

“Yes?” he answers innocently.

Hannibal sighs.

“Hey, but that scar does make you look pretty badass. I think it’s sexy anyway.”

“Do you?” Hannibal asks with interest.

“It’s one of about a dozen things that look _really_ good on you.”

“What are the other eleven?”

“You want me to make a list?”

“You made it sound as if you had one already,” Hannibal says, clearly throwing down a challenge with his coy tone of voice. It’s 11 PM in Wolf Trap and 4 PM in Auckland, so they’re both reasonably awake and capable of having this conversation if Will allows it. “We could take turns if you’d like.”

He imagines Will licking his lips like he does without fail when he finds something intriguing or exciting and looks around for a pen and paper. Will shuffles on the other side, either getting ready for bed or similarly rooting around like Hannibal for stationery. 

“All right, should I go first?”

“You have already,” Hannibal reminds Will as he’s lying down on his back. He keeps his hand poised loosely over a notepad and the rest of his body relaxed. “My scar?”

Will hums, shuffles a bit more, and sighs. He says, “Then you’re up.”

“My first mention should be your hands. I love the shape of them, how your knuckles curve outward so slightly, and how your fingers are long. When you play the theremin, I don’t know whether to study your fingers or the sounds they produce, so enrapturing are your hands.”

Hannibal scribbles messily onto the page: _#1) Hands_. 

“Your turn.”

Will takes a breath.

“Um, I guess…your eyes. They remind me of the city when you’re up high and the sun is setting and everything earthen takes on that flush of almost-red-almost-pink. You and Mischa have really similar eyes except hers are the colder hues of green and yours are the warmer ones. She’s got the gray and you’ve got the hazel. It works somehow. It makes sense.”

Hannibal smiles at the comparison and at the gentle poetry of Will’s commentary.

“Your hair: how could I not love to push my fingers through it? I feel as though it should be a given. It reminds me of the stories my father told me once of the rusalki—mermaids. He said they had such gifts for song that they could lure men to cliffs or into the endless waters. I thought that was beautiful, if macabre.” Hannibal shrugs, unseen, and writes _#2) Hair_ on his list. “I don’t know why that’s what I think of, but it is.”

Will chuckles low, saying, “It really wouldn’t be the first time someone said something like that about me.”

“That you are lovely and macabre?”

“Lovely _but_ macabre, usually,” he answers quietly.

“Then they didn’t understand you and it was their loss, not yours.”

Will is silent for a moment and softens his voice to say, “I love your lips. You always look like you’ve just been kissed dizzy, which then makes me dizzy.”

Hannibal grins behind his hand before dropping it back to his notepad and scribbling down his next claim before speaking it aloud: “Your Adam’s apple. It drives me mad.”

“I know it does,” Will mumbles with an obvious smirk on his face that Hannibal wishes he could see. “Your chest hair.”

“Your stubble.”

“Your knobby toes.”

“Your shapely knees.”

“Ooh, you think they’re shapely?”

“Yes, I’m quite fond of them.”

Pleased, Will says, “Too bad it’ll probably snow the day you’re coming back, or I’d pick you up at the airport in shorts.”

“Such is my fate, I suppose.”

Will hums thoughtfully, considering his remaining options.

“I like it when you smile with teeth, so I have to say your teeth.”

Hannibal refrains from asking why, not wanting to direct attention to that particular insecurity, but of course, Will detects his self-consciousness immediately.

“Your teeth are sweet. You look young when you show them in your smile. Your laugh lines come out and your whole face lights up. Plus, usually if your teeth are showing, you’re laughing or you’re about to laugh, and your laugh is even sweeter than your teeth.”

Hannibal bites his lip and quietly asks, “Is that the next item on your list?”

“Sure,” Will murmurs in response. “That means you have to do two.”

“Your shoulder blades and your belly button: the former for their sensuality and the latter because your navel fascinates me.”

Will snorts. “Weirdo. In that case, the soles of your feet, because they’re ticklish and you make that funny noise when I touch them. Very sexy.”

“Your scar, where they dug the bullet out.” He hears Will suck in a quiet breath. “You know why.”

_I see it as the place where God laid His hand on you when he refused to let you die._

Will clears his throat and says, “The peacock on your chest, which I liked at first because it’s a brilliant piece of art, but the reason I love it is because it’s just another example of how much you love your sister. I admire the bond you have with her. It’s special.”

“And your tattoo: ‘Crazy Once You Know.’ I appreciate what the lyrics mean to you, and I enjoy the memory of my first time seeing it.”

“The spot just beneath your throat where it dips.”

“The suprasternal notch,” Hannibal tells him.

“Yeah, I like to press my tongue there.”

“Is that what we’ve come to?” he muses, going warm through his chest and in his belly at the thought of Will’s tongue there at the dip beneath his throat just like he said. “Then the next logical choice would be your nipples, sensitive as they are.”

“And you’d press your tongue there?” Will asks, not quite breathless but approaching something like it. “No, you like them in your mouth so you can roll your tongue against them. Switch back and forth until both go hard and warm in your mouth. That’s how I like it.”

“Where next, Will?”

Hannibal’s question _is_ breathless. Will’s response still isn’t.

“Down your stomach, down further: run my tongue along the crease at your hip then mouth my way back down, inching toward your cock.”

“Mine? In your mouth, Will?”

Will sighs, and there he is. He breathes, “Yes, Hannibal, _God_ , yes.”

Hannibal fumbles at his trousers and gets them down past his hips, grunting for Will’s benefit when he gets himself in hand. The warm sweat on his palm and the moisture beading at the head of his cock help him. Will’s quiet, urgent moans in his ear encourage him along. The veritable mess in his hand 

“Would you like for me to fuck your mouth, Will? Would you like that?”

“ _Oh_ , we haven’t done that, not really.”

“Do you like that? We could if you want to. You could fuck my mouth.”

“ _Shit_.”

A groan escapes from Hannibal’s throat, choked off and desperate, at the profanity. He hears another muffled swear from Will and rushes his hand on his cock only to drop the phone from his shoulder and flail off the bed when his door swings open. 

“Oh my God!” Donald screams at the same time that Hannibal yells, “Donald!”

Vaguely he hears Will saying, _“Donald?”_

“ _Get out!_ ”

Donald has yanked the door closed by that point, but his shadow lurks still on the other side of the door. A few seconds tick by, and Donald says, “We were going out to dinner…”

Hannibal sighs and grumbles, “Give me a moment.”

“Hannibal?”

“Five minutes, Donald!”

He watches Donald’s shadow retreat and fumbles for his phone. Will, thankfully, is still on the line.

“I apologize for that. I was interrupted.”

“Are you all right? It sounded like you took a table down with you.”

Hannibal looks around to gauge his surroundings. As it happens, he did knock over the desk lamp.

“I’m certain I will bruise, but other than that, yes. Considering I have walked in on him in the past, this is hardly a shocking experience.”

“Speak for yourself,” Will mumbles, though he sounds like he’s trying not to laugh. “I’ll make it up to you when you’re back. Won’t be long now.”

“No, just a few more days. I should get dressed. Donald will be back to collect me in a few minutes’ time.”

“Okay, play well tonight. I love you.”

“I love you, too,” rolls off his tongue easier than he expected it would.

They go to SidArt, all of them much more relaxed than they had been. Abel sits with Bryn, Donald, Elliot, and Martin at a round table. Hannibal sits with Randall and Bedelia at a smaller square table. Randall keeps a calm smile on his face as they place their orders. He offers harmless small talk while his tablemates coolly sip their water.

“Donald mentioned your boyfriend’s concert in January,” he says once their food has arrived and he appears to have grown tired of carrying the conversation. “He said you were all invited.”

“That’s right,” Hannibal tells him after sharing a significant look with Bedelia.

“Could I go?”

Anyone else would offer some sort of explanation or excuse for asking or even apologize for the imposition of inviting themselves along, but not Randall. He just keeps his expression open, the soft line of his mouth innocently curious and in between a smile and a frown. Hannibal glances at Bedelia as if for permission, but she looks as conflicted as he feels.

“It’s a public event, Randall,” she says slowly, pausing to drink. “You want to go?”

“Yeah, I’ve been hearing about what he can do for months now,” Randall muses, and his tone could almost be considering teasing. “I want to see if he’s all you chalk him up to be.”

“That could be arranged,” Hannibal replies carefully, still watching Bedelia for her reaction.

Randall glances between them and asks, “Do you not want me to go?”

“Donald wants to use the event to find you a boyfriend.”

Hannibal looks at her, alarmed but also really not.

“I know.” Randall shrugs, casting an endeared glance at Donald’s table. “He hasn’t been subtle about it.”

“Is Donald ever subtle about anything?” Hannibal says flatly.

The show goes over without a hitch. Elliot looks ready to drop from exhaustion and Martin looks and smells like he’s been playing cards in a smoky backroom somewhere for the past ten hours or so. Bedelia is the only one among them who holds onto some semblance of grace as they stumble back to the hotel to collapse in their rooms. Even Bryn looks tired and walks gingerly on her ankle, though she’s been fine to walk on it for about a week, just as the doctors predicted.

Donald wisely doesn’t offer Hannibal a cigarette but actually throws the pack he’s halfway through smoking into a garbage bin in the lobby. He just shrugs at Hannibal’s arched eyebrow. They take the next day to recuperate and then fly back on the fifteenth of December.

Hannibal strums one of Donald’s guitars on the plane, and Donald reads one of Bedelia’s books with his feet up on his seat. Bryn sketches a picture of Randall while he sleeps and Abel adds flowers weaved into his hair after she’s set it aside. Elliot sleeps like the dead and Martin types madly on his laptop, doing God only knows what.

Randall wakes when they stop in San Francisco where the plane is grounded for upwards of five hours. He takes a shuttle with Hannibal to the Golden Gate Bridge. They share the last of the amanattō as they go walking, and Randall snaps pictures on his phone like a blissful tourist until Elliot retrieves them in a cab on the other side of the bridge. On the plane to Baltimore, Martin and Elliot switch roles with Martin out cold and Elliot typing furiously on their shared laptop. Bryn starts a new sketch of Hannibal, which leads Randall to discover her drawing of him. He chuckles at the flowers Abel drew on afterward.

They get into Baltimore/Washington International at 9 AM and trudge through the familiar terminals until they get to the escalator where their rather unenthusiastic-looking welcoming party waits to meet them: Elliot’s wife, Emma, who looks rested in all the ways her wired husband does not; Martin’s sister, Dinah; Bedelia’s mother; Mischa, Will, and Abigail.

Hannibal hugs his sister and kisses her cheek before turning his attention to Will and Abigail, kissing the former and tentatively offering a hug for the latter, beaming when she takes it without a second thought. Randall goes with Bedelia and her mother, who kisses him on the forehead when he goes to meet her. Martin and Dinah take Donald with them, and Bryn goes with Abel to ride home with Mischa for breakfast. Hannibal promises to visit her later to see about Kačiukas and for the time being, goes with Will and Abigail to the car lot.

Will takes his hand as they walk, and Abigail speaks for them, a couple paces ahead of them, oblivious or perfectly, unobtrusively aware of the silent conversation they have with their eyes. Will slides into the driver’s seat and Abigail piles into the backseat before Hannibal can offer her the passenger’s seat. He takes Will’s hand once they’re on the road again and relaxes, closing his eyes and listening to Will and Abigail talk around him.

The orchestra is ready for the concert in January, the cellist named Peter finally broke things off with his vastly inadequate boyfriend, Barney met the dogs when Margot and Elise came over for dinner and fell in love with Winston, and Will’s friend at the music shop, Tobias, started dating someone and Will is apparently very excited to see what comes of it.

“Love is in the air, it seems,” Hannibal muses warmly.

Will looks at Abigail briefly in the rear view mirror, a small smile on his face. He says, “Mm-hmm.”

Abigail blushes when Hannibal turns in his seat. She doesn’t say anything, so he doesn’t ask. Hannibal thinks to change the subject and then does so, in a roundabout way.

“Randall expressed a desire to attend your concert.”

“Oh?” Will grins. “He’s welcome to it.” 

“There was another thing. Donald is determined to find a boyfriend for Randall. He has decided the concert will provide the right kind of environment to facilitate his scheming.”

Abigail snorts from the backseat. Before Will can react, she says, “Peter _did_ just dump that idiot he was with.” For Hannibal’s benefit, she adds, “Peter comes over for dinner sometimes after rehearsal. He’s sort of quiet, but really, really sweet.”

“There is Peter,” Will says thoughtfully. “I’m not sure he’s ready for that yet.”

“Well, what’s Randall like?”

“Intelligent,” Hannibal answers reflexively. “Sometimes serious, sometimes carefree.”

They consider his input for a few seconds, Abigail swatting the back of Will’s seat as an idea occurs to her.

“You know who’s obviously single and into guys?”

Hannibal squints at Will’s frown and more so when he says, “Ah, Matthew.”

“Matthew?”

Will waves his hand dismissively. Oblivious, Abigail supplies, “That pretty boy flautist who plays with the symphony.”

“Oh, he’s pretty, is he?” Hannibal asks with raised eyebrows, smirking when Will’s face goes beet red. “And a _flautist_?”

“Yes, he’s—don’t look at me like that. He’s our first chair. He plays really well.”

Genuinely curious for Randall’s sake, though Will embarrassed is deeply entertaining, Hannibal asks, “How serious is he about music?”

“Uh, from what I can tell, it’s pretty important to him. He’s a better musician than he is a car mechanic, in any case.”

“Why do you say that?”

“He’s got this old Chevy that barely runs, and every time after practice without fail, something bad happens to it. I don’t think he knows the first thing about car maintenance.”

Hannibal hums thoughtfully, wondering if mention of the Chevy to Randall would pique his interest enough for a conversation. What had he said to Donald?

_Find a way to combine advanced mechanics with music, and I’m sure he will be pleased._

“Donald will be so happy to discover that I have recruited you to his cause.”

“Is Donald in a relationship? We should find _him_ somebody,” Abigail suggests, plucking the tissue paper off the gift bag he brought for her from San Francisco. “Turnabout’s fair play.”

Hannibal opens his mouth, closes it, and makes a pondering sound.

“Donald likes to fend for himself.”

“Randall doesn’t?” Will asks as he pulls the car up around the side of the house.

Abigail gets out of the car with one of Hannibal’s suitcases and the gift bag, leaving them to talk.

“Randall tends not to concern himself with relationships outside of the ones he has already.” Hannibal shrugs, rubbing his thumb over Will’s wrist. “I think Donald worries that Randall will be lonesome now that the band has called a hiatus.”

“And what do you think?” Will asks after a pause. “Is he right?”

“Hard to say. He might be. Randall knows Donald’s intentions and has offered no objection. I think more than anything else, he is intrigued as to what might happen.”

“That’s a good way to be.”

Hannibal squeezes Will’s hand and nods. He murmurs, “Yes, it is.”

“You ready to go inside?”

“Yes.”

Will smiles, leans in to kiss Hannibal, and tugs on his hand.

“Let’s go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for this chapter coming to you so late, and apologies if there are typos.


	29. I’ve Been Loving You Too Long

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> IT’S CHRISTMASTIME IN THE SFTD UNIVERSE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _My love is growing stronger as you become a haven to me / I’ve been loving you a little too long, I can’t stop now_
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> Enjoy this Christmas sequence that I wrote in fucking July. Eyyyyy.

Will wakes up on Christmas Eve with Hannibal adhered to his back and an arm draped protectively around his middle. Buster is asleep up on the floor on Will’s side with Winston by the door. Madeline is fast asleep right on the bed with them at Hannibal’s feet. He can’t hear if Abigail’s up yet, but the house seems silent enough.

“Are you awake?” Hannibal mumbles near his ear.

Will laughs at the warm tickle of breath. Feeling impish, he says, “No.”

Hannibal hums, sounding awfully close to a whine, and tightens his hold around Will’s waist. He sighs. “All right.”

He lasts a few seconds but Will has to laugh. Hannibal sounds sleep-drunk and miserable. They probably shouldn’t have had quite so many drinks with Beverly, Jimmy, and Brian last night. Will is still of the opinion that Hannibal doesn’t get hangovers—tolerance and all that—but then again he’s never actually seen his boyfriend good and utterly drunk. Last night was something of a revelation.

Jimmy and Brian had been slightly less star struck than he expected, which is to say they didn’t ask for autographs even though it had looked like a near thing. Beverly was funny and smart the whole time, cracking jokes they could all laugh at and teasing Jimmy and Brian when Will was too flustered to do it himself. Hannibal sparkled, but Will knew he would so it wasn’t surprising to watch him charm Jimmy instantly or win Brian over by the third round of drinks.

There were fans of Nemean Lion who wanted pictures with Hannibal and that _was_ surprising, but Will never had time to feel awkward or excluded. Hannibal remained touching him always, whether it was his hand on Will’s back, his elbow grazing Will’s arm, or his foot nudging him discreetly under the bar.

He opted to be their designated driver, so he only had the one drink at the start of the night. Jimmy shared in his sobriety and as they were the only ones, there was a special kind of joy in watching Beverly, Brian, and fucking Hannibal Lecter slip gracelessly into inebriation together. Jimmy took photos and posted the least incriminating ones to Facebook, prompting a memory from the night Will met Hannibal.

 _I hope you’re out on a date and not wandering around with price and Zeller again,_ Abigail had texted him. _I saw the pictures on facebook, not very flattering._

“I didn’t know you could dance like that,” Will teases through a wide grin that Hannibal would see if he lifted his face from the curve of his neck. “I’m kind of embarrassed.”

Hannibal’s lips moved as if to bite him but all Will felt was a sloppy kiss pressed into his neck. He wrinkled his nose and Hannibal hummed with his mouth hovering over the place behind Will’s ear.

“Cutting off reflected failure is an unattractive survival instinct on you.”

“Reflected failure?” Will turns quickly in Hannibal’s arms so that he can reciprocate the hold. “Hell no. I meant I’m embarrassed that you had me for a dance partner. Beverly will never let me live it down.”

Already he was prepared for the barrage of texts she would send him once she woke up. Jimmy will have tagged them all in his photos from the bar by now. Will hadn’t looked at them since last night, but he sort of dreads going back to them now. After all, the last time he was photographed with Hannibal, it hadn’t been something he was happy seeing publicized.

He’s not concerned about the pictures Jimmy took, funnily enough. He’s certainly not ashamed of their relationship or of people knowing which one of them is lighter on his feet.

“I should hope not,” Hannibal slurs back, very sleepy still and every bit as plaintive as he had been before. “But you never claimed to be a dancer. My composer, music teacher…dog trainer…”

Will sputters around a laugh and pokes Hannibal’s chest. Hannibal makes a disgruntled noise but settles when Will’s palm flattens against his skin. His fingers play with the gray smattering of chest hair beneath his hand and trace the edges of the peacock tattooed on his skin.

“You’re sure you don’t need to see your family today?” he asks into Hannibal’s throat.

The answering hum buzzes comfortably against his lips. Hannibal presses a slightly more cognizant hand into the small of Will’s back and makes no move to continue the conversation. Will closes his eyes, content to lie with Hannibal a while longer. The hand at his back wanders, creeping up so that fingers can trace the bottom of Will’s ribcage.

He wonders if Hannibal wanted to go to sleep but can’t now and tries really hard to feel guilty. His poor attempts must be obvious on some telepathic wavelength because Hannibal squeezes Will’s fourth and fifth ribs and grins at the protesting squawk his effort earns him.

Madeline stirs at their noise and jumps off the bed. Will looks over his shoulder to watch her trot over to Buster’s side and rest her head over his back. Buster snuffles in his sleep but doesn’t wake.

Hannibal curls his arm around Will’s back and sighs contentedly. He smells like trees and spice, and breathing him in to the sound of his and his dogs’ breathing relaxes Will completely.

Will drifts back to sleep and wakes to an empty bed however many hours later. The smell of bacon cooking in the kitchen wafts in through the cracked door. He blearily throws on some clothes, scrubs a hand through his messy hair, and walks through the hallway toward the aroma of apples and batter.

Abigail is seated at the table with coffee, a carafe of dark syrup, and a short stack of clean plates. Hannibal stands at the stove flipping a pancake in one pan and delicately extracting a strip of bacon from the one beside it. Will pours himself a cup of coffee from the new coffee maker Hannibal bought him as an early Christmas present and leans in to kiss Hannibal on the cheek as he’s stirring sugar into his mug.

“Morning, again.”

“Morning again, Will,” Hannibal muses back, turning to plant a kiss flush on Will’s bottom lip. “Are you hungry?”

“Yes.”

“These are almost finished,” he says agreeably enough. “A few minutes more.”

Will kisses him again because he can’t help it and takes his coffee back to the table. Abigail has produced a newspaper from somewhere and has her chair pushed back a ways from the table so she can read it over her lap. Her scarf is white today, offset by the predominantly red Christmas sweater with the overly pleasant evergreen stitched onto the shoulder.

“What’s new in the world?” he asks in between sips.

She gives him the rundown, most of it coming from the economy page. It’s not exciting stuff, judging by her bland report of it, but she clearly understands it better than he does.

He’s never really asked much about what her parents were like, but he’s deeply curious where all the aspects of her personality come from. Economics, for example; did she pick it up because of them or because of herself? She’s a whole universe of a human being and she’s never been uninteresting to him.

Even if they are in a more stable relationship now than they were in the beginning, he still doesn’t consider himself worthy of asking those questions. Mentioning her parents in such ways could be painful and he just doesn’t know.

Not to say that they haven’t talked about her parents and not that Abigail hasn’t taken to painting them in a more or less realistic light. They have and she has. Maybe it isn’t any easier for her to think about what happened, but it doesn’t rule her like it still tries to rule him. He’s pretty sure she knows it and more, that she’s always known.

His face must be doing something weird and expressive because she looks up from the paper at his face, searches briefly with her eyes, and smiles. She says, “Can you believe Marissa’s majoring in this stuff? I’d die of boredom.”

“Facts aren’t nearly as interesting in abstraction as they are in application,” Hannibal points out, emerging from the kitchen with a plate piled high with pancakes. He sets it down in the middle of the table. “Although there is a certain mathematical beauty to abstraction—such as that of time and its irreversibility.”

Hannibal serves Abigail first and then Will and then himself. He sits across from Will and to Abigail’s left.

“I think time does reverse,” Will muses, concentrating on pouring a moderate amount of syrup onto his pancakes once Abigail’s done with it. “You just can’t think of it linearly.”

“Ooh,” Abigail remarks, cutting a piece out of her pancake with a fork. “Metaphysics first thing in the morning.”

“We have coffee. We’re eating,” Will counters, smiling at her and then at Hannibal. “ _First_ thing this morning we were discussing Hannibal’s drunken dancing, so really…” He grins over the sound of Hannibal’s surprised chuckle. “It’s more like, metaphysics seventh or eighth thing in the morning.”

Abigail shakes her head but there’s a smile on her face. She takes a pointed drink of her coffee and looks at Hannibal. “The floor’s yours if you want it. Oh—for metaphysics, that is. Unless you feel like dancing.”

Hannibal smirks and straightens out a bit taller in his chair, looking dignified even as he chews on a crunchy piece of bacon. He tilts his head at Will, swallows, and says, “Perhaps later a demonstration will be in order.”

“We’re talking the kind of dancing _I_ could see, too, right? Because now I’m really curious.”

“Abigail,” Will hisses, scandalized and blushing.

“Naturally.” Hannibal smiles down at his plate. He harrumphs once and lifts his face after a moment. Will stares at his pinked cheeks. “It would be inappropriate to suggest otherwise over breakfast.”

Abigail muffles her snickering with her mug. Will covers his eyes with one hand.

“Um,” she chuckles, setting down her coffee to cut another forkful out of her pancakes. “So, time.”

Hannibal nudges Will’s ankle gently, bare toes probing at him gently through his sock. “You were saying nonlinear time renders events unchangeable. Would you instead propose a cyclical interpretation?”

“Sure.” Will has a long drink of coffee, trying to consume as much of its waning heat as he can. He also wills the fire in his cheeks and neck to recede. “Time is something we invent anyway. We use it to describe how long it takes any one action to be completed.”

“For something to rotate or revolve,” Abigail chimes in, smiling when they both look at her. She shrugs. “More cycles.”

Hannibal smiles, looking besotted and ridiculously endeared, as he tends to anytime Abigail says or does virtually anything. Will cuts another square out of the stack of pancakes on his plate and runs to get the door when Penelope scratches to be let out. He sits back down before Hannibal continues their conversation.

“By your estimation, by looking at time as a loop rather than a straight line, we could go back to La Fin Absolue du Monde and unshatter your beer bottle?”

Will contemplates the implications. He’d dropped his beer because he’d been staring at Hannibal, utterly engrossed with everything about him from his playing to the tattoos on his hands to the markings in his saxophone.

 _Once you managed to make eye contact, there was really nothing I could have done,_ Hannibal confessed over the phone one night when the world had been between them but still couldn’t separate them. _You were staring at me._

“Well, maybe not literally,” Will cedes with some reluctance. “But any number of things could happen to undo its effect on either of us and how we perceive it today. Like tides and shorelines, I guess. The effects of things can erode, but the memory of them lingers.”

Hannibal smiles like the suggestion pleases him. He doesn’t say that it does, but there’s warmth in his eyes that Will’s grown deeply fond of after all their time spent together. This man is a pillar to him and it’s unreal to think that something as seemingly inconsequential as broken glass could have brought them together. Will stands to clear the table, flustered slightly at his staring at Hannibal while Abigail’s right there watching them with her cheek in her palm.

“Is Mischa coming over today?” Abigail asks Hannibal while Will ducks into the kitchen to wash dishes. “What are her plans for the holiday?”

“She is at the shop with her associate, Ardelia. They will go back to my sister’s house tonight to celebrate with the band and a few of Ardelia’s close friends.”

“You aren’t going to go?”

Will dries the plates he’s washed and puts them and the silverware away. He hears a chair scrape the floor behind him.

“I would rather be here. They have had my company for months now, and as for my sister, I will see her tomorrow. We can all go if you have no other plans.”

Walking back to where the table is shows Will Hannibal still seated at the table with his hands folded in front of him. Abigail is standing across from him with her hands on the back of the chair Will had been sitting in. Abigail looks to Will while Hannibal continues to look at her.

“Can we? I miss Bixie and Tian.”

Will gives a little chuckle at her sincerity and shrugs, saying, “Sure. I don’t see why not.” He turns to address Hannibal, mirroring Abigail’s resting position by placing his hands on the back of a chair. “It’s too bad we can’t just send Matthew to your sister’s private party.”

Hannibal takes his hands off the table and tilts his head, curious at the thought. “Why couldn’t we?”

“Because he wouldn’t know anyone and it would be weird,” Will answers, also tilting his head and earning himself a sly smile from Hannibal. “Also because it’s Christmas Eve and for all we know, he could be across the country visiting family.”

“It’s too bad,” Abigail sighs, offering a little shrug. “But at least if they meet at the concert, there’s a chance for me to see the sparks fly.”

She breezes out of the room, strides to the door to outside, and gets her boots and coat on before ducking outside to run with the dogs in the snow. Will sits where Abigail was for breakfast and grabs both of Hannibal’s hands with his own, unprompted and providing no explanation for the gesture. Hannibal studies Will’s face for a few seconds before relaxing in his seat.

“Abigail has met Matthew then?”

“I needed a ride after one of our rehearsals a few weeks back. Abigail’s car was in the shop, so I let her use it for work. Beverly gave me a ride to the Academy in the morning and Abigail picked me up after. Peter was there, too, but they’d met by that point. Honestly, I think she finds Peter more interesting.”

“As do you,” Hannibal fills in. “Peter, the gifted cellist.”

“Yes. He’s…he’s a lot of fun. You’ll have to meet him at the concert. Or we can have him over for dinner one of these nights after the holidays wrap up.”

“I would like that, and I would like to hear the two of you play, whenever it is convenient.”

“I’ll ask him,” Will says in a reverent kind of voice. Sharing that with Hannibal would make him all kinds of happy. He’ll just have to bring it up with Peter sometime and they can make a day of it. “The last time he was here he got Abigail to promise they’d play something together. Sometimes I forget she plays the clarinet as well as she paints.”

“It seems there are a great many things you have to show me.”

“I’m looking forward to every last one of them,” Will confesses, trying not grin but failing spectacularly. “That’s not even to mention your friends and my friends and how we’re going to get all of them in the same room together. After the concert, I mean.”

“I had entertained thoughts of the Fogo de Chão as a possible venue. It could handle all of us, your party and mine. We would have to go to Baltimore, of course, but the commute from here to there is hardly an obstacle for either of us at this point.”

“Point. We should probably think of getting reservations now then. How many of us is that?”

“Who all are we including?”

“Well. Beverly, Jimmy, Brian, us…Abigail?”

“If she would like. That makes six so far.”

“Okay and then Mischa, Abel, Donald, Bryn, Bedelia, and Randall? Twelve?”

“Roughly.”

“That’s not _terrible_.”

Hannibal smiles. “Perhaps we should invite Peter as well. And reserve a seat for Matthew in the event that Randall finds him interesting.”

“And if he doesn’t?”

“Marissa.” Hannibal shrugs. “Or Clarice. I have no doubt that we could make any of them feel welcome.”

Will hums. “We could invite Alana. Also Miriam.”

“Miriam is the symphony’s former conductor?”

“Yeah,” Will says, refiguring numbers. “Shit. Maybe we should invite all of them. Jack might like to come. You could meet his wife, Bella. She’s great.”

With a lilt in his voice that likely denotes entertainment, Hannibal muses, “It may be more prudent of us to host this party ourselves rather than to book an entire restaurant for the night.”

“That’s a lot of food.”

Hannibal shrugs. “It’s nothing I haven’t done before.”

“Really.”

“Oh yes.” Hannibal gets a look in his eye like Will’s just challenged his ability and he has every intention of proving himself. “Didn’t I tell you of my plans to open a restaurant with Donald?”

Will beams at the satisfied, proud little smile on Hannibal’s face and presses a firm kiss onto his lips. “You’ll enjoy it then. I guess we could consider it a wrap party. ‘Thanks for making music with us!’”

“Not a terrible idea for a party banner. Were you thinking glitter and streamers?”

“You hush.” Will kisses him again. “Don’t even act like glitter and streamers aren’t more consistent with your personality than they are with mine.”

“Glitter and _streamers_ are more consistent with my personality?” Hannibal asks with a disbelieving but amused tone. “How so?”

“You have a peacock on your chest, Hannibal.”

Hannibal manages a straight face for about five seconds before laughing. Will laughs with him.

“I suppose you aren’t incorrect.”

“Uh huh.” The mention of glitter and streamers reminds him of the fabulously decorated Christmas tree set up in the living room. Abigail had insisted and she, Mischa, and Hannibal had set it up while Will watched through his fingers from the couch. “Oh. You never answered my question yesterday. Are we each opening one present today or not?”

“I’m not opposed to the break in tradition. We didn’t celebrate it growing up, Mischa and I. Gift-giving, certainly. But the rigid structure of when one is _allowed_ to open presents? Hardly.”

Will bounces slightly in his seat. “Do you know which one you’re going to open?”

Hannibal quirks an eyebrow at him and replies, “Abigail’s. The one with snowflake wrapping paper. And which one will you open, Will?”

“Yours,” he says, easy as anything. “The small, heavy one.”

A wicked little smile spreads across Hannibal’s face. “Oh, good.”

“It isn’t a sex toy, is it?” Will dares to guess, already beginning to blush, damn it.

“No,” Hannibal answers, looking more shocked than he sounds. “I wouldn’t put _that_ under the tree. Abigail might see, and you would be shamed for all eternity.”

Will lays his head on the table with their hands clasped in front of him. Leave it to him to end up living with two perfectly bold, uneasily embarrassed people. His father would marvel at the pair Hannibal and Abigail make—more at the fact that Will cohabitates with them in harmony than anything else. Individually, he thinks his father would be deeply impressed with both of them on their own merits, though he’d pretend not to be phased by Hannibal’s stardom as Nemean Lion’s saxophonist.

His father hadn’t wanted Will to make the trip for Christmas. It was never a big deal to them growing up anyway, but Will suspects he’d shied away from the offer on account of the people in his life that he currently loves most in the world.

It’s always been pretty clear to Will that his father can’t accept the unlikeliness of his son ever settling down with a Nice Girl and having some kids. He’d felt entitled to a brood of grandchildren to dote on more than he ever had on his only child, but now that Hannibal and Abigail are in Will’s life to stay those dreams are solidly shot.

Will doesn’t think of it as a loss on his part. He’d been hoping he wouldn’t have to be away from Hannibal again and he’d also been hoping he wouldn’t have to subject him and Abigail—or himself—to his father’s influence.

He’d prefer to spend Christmas with the man he loves and his adopted daughter anyway. They love him. He can accept it now that they do and that the feeling is very much mutual. Hannibal shuffles in his chair, distracting Will from the unwelcome memories of the Christmases from his youth.

“Tell me more about Matthew.”

He sits up straight and ponders the question, attributing his curiosity to thoughts of Randall and whether the two will be compatible. It’d be so much easier to know which qualities to mention if he had a clearer idea of what Randall himself was like.

“He’s young. I don’t mean that he’s immature, but he has a sort of…cockiness to him. It doesn’t translate into his playing so much, but he’s sure of himself like young guys tend to be. Is Randall that way at all? From what you’ve told me, he’s not quite so determined to prove himself. I don’t know, like his energy’s calmer or something.”

“I’ve heard it put in other ways,” Hannibal answers, hesitating. “Donald usually says—fondly, mind you—that Randall has the emotional range of moss on a stone.”

“I’m…not sure what to do with that, actually.”

“Not to say that he doesn’t feel things,” Hannibal hastens to add. “He does, very deeply. However, expressing even the most simplest of emotions for him is a different animal entirely. We’ve grown accustomed to the way he is and can read his joy or his anger or his regret. Someone who does not know him might struggle to understand his heart.”

Will studies Hannibal’s face and catalogues the fierce, determined protectiveness there. He wants to do right by Randall anyway, but the look Hannibal has without realizing Will’s staring makes him want to do better than right.

“Matthew might be the right kind of playful to figure him out,” he offers, making his voice soft. “We can play it by ear. See if they click, or if they don’t.”

Hannibal hums and squeezes one of Will’s hands, thinking. “How does Abigail feel about him, this ‘pretty boy flautist’?”

Will sputters at the nickname and shakes his head, taking back one of his hands to drag it through his hair. Hannibal waits until it returns to the table and patiently reclaims his hold on it.

“Uh, well. She embarrassed the hell out of me when they met, if you must know.” His neck grows warm at the memory of it. “To be fair to Matthew, I think he was also really embarrassed. Flattered, maybe, but embarrassed.”

Hannibal stares at him. A neat little wrinkle forms between his eyebrows. “You don’t mean to say she flirted with him?”

Mortification ripples across Will's face and he full-on blushes. Hannibal surprises him by laughing.

“It was not funny,” Will gripes. “I thought I was going to die.”

Hannibal covers his mouth with one hand and looks away, but it does nothing to conceal his shaking shoulders. Will groans and drops his head into his hands. The backdoor opens and Abigail walks in, oblivious to their predicament but inquiring as to its nature once she gets her boots off. There’s snow in her hair when she comes back to the table.

“I was telling him about when you and Matthew met,” he admits once Hannibal has settled down.

Abigail, utterly shameless so it seems, just smiles wide and owns it. “What? He’s cute.”

And Hannibal, because he is equally shameless and about twice as entertained by the whole thing, just laughs again.

The beauty of the Christmas holiday, Will decides as they relocate to the living room, is that as every minute stretches into an hour and into longer, they have nowhere else to be. He can lounge on the couch with his legs taking up two of the three cushions and stare happily at the tree to which he contributed very little in terms of gratuitously slung tinsel, cheerful LED lights, and red and gold bauble ornaments. The tree is one from his land, though, and he did cut it down himself, so at least he hadn’t been completely useless in the grand scheme of things.

His day gets progressively better when Abigail brings out an easel and the brush set Hannibal bought her to paint their tree on the untouched canvas. Hannibal finally joins them in the living room with two guitars—the Gibson J-200 and the J-35. Will sits up automatically to take one of them off his hands and just as naturally, Hannibal steps up onto the couch behind him in his bare feet and settles in with the J-35 on his lap. 

Abigail looks over her shoulder at them. She’s since changed out of the sweater Marissa got for her and into a black sweatshirt that’s huge on her. There’s already a spot of yellow paint drying near the collar. She just clocks the guitars in their hands and says, “Are you taking requests?”

“What would you like to hear?” Hannibal beats him to the punch, quietly tuning the J-35 behind him.

She taps her cheek with the wooden end of her brush. “‘Blackbird’?”

Will turns to check Hannibal’s reaction. Hannibal looks up from the tuning pegs and raises his eyebrows.

“Do you know it?” he asks.

Raising his own eyebrows, Will says, “Yes. Really?”

“I recall that you declined my offer to participate in ‘Let It Be’ with my uncle and me.”

“What?” Will stops tuning the J-200 and lays it down on his lap, turning slightly to face Hannibal more fully. “Oh come on, I had stage fright because it was my first time meeting him, not because I’m unfamiliar with the Beatles.”

Hannibal shrugs, unconvinced. He gives Abigail a conspiratorial look over Will’s head. “What do you think? Shall we risk it?”

Abigail laughs but has turned back to her easel when Will whips around to frown at her. 

“Okay, seriously? Pick a key.” He looks at Hannibal and positions the guitar properly in his lap. “Pick a key so I can school you.”

“Ooh,” he hears Abigail murmur quietly behind him.

Hannibal just looks delighted like confrontation is an adorable look on Will. He probably thinks it is, handsome bastard that he is.

“Will you sing?” Abigail asks him with a solemn, hopeful expression that punctures and deflates his ire.

He sighs. “Sure.”

Even in spite of his inclination to keep up the charade and act put upon at Hannibal’s teasing, he relaxes into the music. In his defense, it’s a sweet song.

“Blackbird singing in the dead of night. Take these broken wings and learn to fly. All your life, you were only waiting for this moment to arise. Blackbird singing in the dead of night. Take these sunken eyes and learn to see. All your life, you were only waiting for this moment to be free.”

The lyrics, as he sings them soft and slow, strike cold chords of remembrance deep in his heart. He knows it will for Hannibal and Abigail, too, but when Hannibal sings the chorus with him—not at the same pitch but fitting with him better for his difference—he only looks happy.

“Blackbird, fly. Blackbird, fly—into the light of a dark, black night. All your life, you were only waiting for this moment to arise.”

It feels right. It feels so right.

Their day winds down into songs played and whispers of brushstrokes on cotton. Will inches down on the couch to sprawl out with his head on Hannibal’s knee and the J-35 carefully held mere inches behind him. The thrum of the strings when Hannibal plays them sounds closer that way, physically near but also intimate. He’s so relaxed after they get through ‘Scarborough Fair’ that he doesn’t even try to sit up when Abigail stands and looks expectantly at them.

If he didn’t need to concentrate just a little bit on his right hand, he probably would have nodded off a few songs ago. The chords are remembered almost entirely from muscle memory alone, so his left hand hardly needs any attention.

“Think I’m gonna open a present. You guys can keep playing.”

Hannibal starts to lean the J-35 carefully against the coffee table and Will grudgingly gets up. As comfortable as it is kicking back halfway in Hannibal’s lap, he’s really curious about the small, heavy present that’s not a sex toy, allegedly.

He gets a look at the work in progress on Abigail’s canvas while she’s rooting through the presents beneath the tree. She’s painted an eruption of green with tiny exploded cosmos of color meant to resemble the lights. There are little streams of shimmering white that weave through the green—a generous depiction of the tinsel.

Abigail ends up opening Will’s present to her. She draws it out from under the tree and sits there on the floor next to it, little pinpoints of red, yellow, blue, and green light dancing on her cheek. Will watches her pry the taped edges up until she can pull it off in neat patches and folds his arms on the couch armrest once she gets an eyeful of what it is. Her eyebrows draw together before a laugh startles out of her. She gives him an accusing look and holds it up for Hannibal to see. Will can hear him squinting.

“Is that a moose?”

“This is because I confessed to ruining your coffee, right? It’s not healthy to hold grudges.”

“I promise the other things I got you aren’t ridiculous,” he promises lazily, stretching a bit when Hannibal kneads at his shoulder.

“Your turn,” Hannibal tells Will, ushering him to sit up.

“Oh God, okay.”

Abigail finds the one he wants and hands it to him. He slides off the couch to lean his back against it and tears through the matte blue paper to get to a cardboard box, no doubt meant to hide the shape of the gift itself or of the packaging it came in. The tape securing the flap comes up easily enough and reaches what looks to be a watch box. He tries not to panic and opens that, too.

Inside is a business card that reads, _Jessica Sergeant – Tailor_

“You bought me a suit?” He leans his head back onto the edge of the cushion and relaxes, uncertain of why he tensed up in the first place. “For the concert, I take it?”

“We discussed it before,” Hannibal answers readily enough, though he looks confused at something in Will’s reaction. “I hope you haven’t changed your mind.”

“No, I still want to.” He reaches over and squeezes Hannibal’s knee. “I’ll need all the help I can get.”

“You realize you could make a burlap sack work, right?” Abigail chimes in, bringing a present wrapped in glossy, purple paper. Hannibal must have told her hers was the one he wanted to open today.

“She’s right, you know,” Hannibal says cheerfully. “If it were not the principle of the thing to adhere to ceremony, we could all go in our nightclothes.” He looks at Will. “Perhaps not you.”

“What?”

Abigail just laughs and perches on the edge of the coffee table to watch Hannibal open her present. He’s slow about it, but she doesn’t get impatient or fidgety—just waits for it all to be shown. A wide smile spreads on Hannibal’s face and Will gets one to match at the sight of the peacock rendered in a woodblock printing.

“Did you make this yourself?”

She nods, doing nothing to hide her answering grin. Hannibal chuckles and looks at her, shaking his head.

“I don’t suppose I will ever live that down.”

Her grin shivers into a laugh and Hannibal gives a miserable little moan. Will starts to ask what the hell the deal is with the woodblock prints already but Abigail stands to her feet and wraps her arms around Hannibal’s torso. All Will can do is watch Hannibal slowly raise his arms to hold her back.

As day shifts into late afternoon and early evening, Hannibal cooks ham for dinner. Once they’re all fed and the dishes are cleaned, he makes apple cider and eggnog generously spiked with rum. Hannibal teaches Abigail a fairly simple version of ‘Heart and Soul’ on the piano while Will stands post at the backdoor to wipe down the dogs’ paws before they track mud and snow all over the floor. He’s well into his fourth eggnog by the time they’re all back inside, so he’s really sort of silly about taking himself back into the living room.

Abigail is still at the piano, exploring the octaves Hannibal showed her. Hannibal is fair game in one of the armchairs by the fire one of them started while Will was in the kitchen. Will sits on him and laughs gleefully at Hannibal’s surprised _whoosh_ of breath.

“Hello.”

Will smiles and hands him his nearly empty glass. “Hi.”

Hannibal takes his glass and leans over the side of the chair to set it down on the floor. He straightens out and squirms a bit until he’s not crammed beneath Will so much as they are equally crushing each other, which is just fine as far as Will is concerned.

“Are we going to wait for midnight, Will?”

“Are we?” He sticks his head up, pushing off Hannibal’s chest with both hands for support to look at Abigail over the back of the chair. “Were you going to?”

Abigail looks back at him with her eyebrows arched. She sits up a bit as if trying to look over the top of the armchair.

He sighs, maneuvers one foot onto the floor, and swivels the chair around so that she can see that they’re not being indecent, thank you very much. She gives him a reproving look when he glances back up at her.

“I didn’t think _that_. I was worried you were _squashing_ him.” To Hannibal only, she asks, “Is he?”

“Yes,” comes the muffled reply. Hannibal grabs Will’s wrists and eases him into a more pliant position. “But I must admit I’m quite enjoying it.”

Abigail makes a dignified sound like, “Pfft,” and turns back to the piano to press a few black keys in slow succession. “I was gonna stay up. Could we watch a movie if you guys don’t go to bed?”

Will thinks that’s code for _Please let’s do something that makes it harder for you to openly cuddle right in front of me._

Hannibal actually pouts when he clambers off the chair and back onto his feet.

“ _It’s a Wonderful Life_ ,” he says, earning a smile from Abigail and an agreeable hum from Hannibal. “You’ve seen it?”

“I grew up in Lithuania, Will. Not under a rock.”

Will just shrugs and roots around in his movie collection for the film when Abigail doesn’t protest. He sits on one end of the couch and Hannibal on their other with Abigail in between them, which he thinks happened by accident but was probably intentional.

Abigail’s painting sits mostly finished, or at least recognizable, off to the side with multi-colored LED lights illuminating the back of the canvas. The dogs crowd around them in furry puddles and some of them snore while the movie plays. Around them the room is warm from the fire and glowing all over. He feels like he himself might be glowing and not just from too much rum and eggnog in his system.

Abigail’s arm is solid and warm next to his. Hannibal’s laugh is near and soft. It certainly is a wonderful life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ‘Blackbird’ by the Beatles
> 
> ‘Scarborough Fair’ by Simon and Garfunkel
> 
> ‘Heart and Soul’ by Hoagy Carmichael
> 
> The ballin’ stackable moose cups (which I'm now realizing I didn't actually say were cups in the fic...my bad)  
> https://098d1f88229f857faf3a-39e302270bfe3570e1446af6312a0494.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/d52b7c9fcf9f9e60d514e77d841bc70c.jpeg
> 
> Also the box with the business card is weighted so as to be sneaky. I meant to say that a bunch of rocks had been taped to the bottom, but Will ended up not investigating it too closely. I just fail all over the place I'm sorry. 
> 
>  
> 
> *My mom’s favorite Christmas movie is apparently _It’s a Wonderful Life_ , so there you go.
> 
> **Two more chapters. I can hang in there for two more chapters, right? RigHT????


	30. She Smiled Sweetly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A long, long, loooong overdue chapter about Christmas and family and baby animals. As told by Abigail Hobbs.
> 
>  
> 
> _She smiled sweetly / And says don't worry / Oh, no, no, no / Where does she hide it inside of her? / That keeps her peace most every day / And won't disappear, my hair's turning grey / But she smiled sweetly_

By the time _It’s a Wonderful Life_ ends, Abigail is half-asleep, Will is fully asleep, and Hannibal is cognizant enough to turn off the TV as the credits begin to roll. Stretching her arms overhead, Abigail manages to accidentally nudge Will off her shoulder, which rouses him from his Disney Princess slumber.

“Oh,” he says, half a yawn and half an actual word. “Is it over?”

Abigail plucks his glasses off their precarious perch by his knee on the couch and hands them to him when he finishes rubbing at his eyes. She tells him, “Yeah, it just ended.”

Will hums, clearly more asleep than he is awake by this point. Hannibal makes a muffled sound to Abigail’s right. When she looks at him, he’s biting his lip to fight a smile—an effort that fails quite amusingly once he sees Abigail catch him at it. She huffs a conspiratorial laugh and pushes to her feet. Will leans his face into the back of the couch, glasses not on his nose but loosely held in his fingers. Abigail glances at Hannibal to make a joke but stops short.

He’s staring at Will with such a peaceful, fond expression, she doesn’t want to ruin the moment. In fact, she’s about to be a mature adult and politely bid them goodnight when Will snuffles, paws at his face, and says:

“I’ll give you my firstborn child if you carry me to my room right now.”

Without thinking, Abigail wrinkles her nose. Hannibal merely stands and dances around Abigail to sweep Will off the couch in one fluid motion. He turns his head to quietly murmur a goodnight to Abigail before turning to go into the hall with Will in tow. As he’s the only one who’s completely cognizant and hasn’t had half a dozen rum-spiked eggnogs, it’s nothing for him to balance Will in his arms. It’s also nothing for him to think up a witty comeback to what Will said before being lifted from the couch.

Abigail hears Hannibal say, “That was an unsubtle way of inviting me to be a father with you, Will.”

And Will, visible only where his feet poke out around Hannibal’s side and where the ring of his arms loops around Hannibal’s neck, shoots back, “Fuck subtle.”

Abigail’s too happy and frankly, too entertained to be embarrassed. She waits a while longer in the living room to watch the snow fall through the windows. The many-colored lights from the tree cast a festive glow that’s difficult not to be warmed by. 

It’s easy to fall asleep that night, even for all that she’s excited about opening up presents in the morning. That excitement just means she wakes up early enough to make coffee and get a jumpstart on breakfast. Hannibal comes out and helps her set the table before everything’s ready to be served. Will comes out a little later with a robe opened up over his usual nightclothes. They have bacon, scrambled eggs, and fried potatoes that Hannibal chopped to look like giant coins, and then they relocate to the living room to finish opening presents.

Will is working on his second cup of coffee when they gather around the tree, so he’s more awake than he has been. He and Hannibal both gesture for Abigail to go first, so she opens one Hannibal brought her from Mischa. It’s wrapped in shiny red paper with a forest green ribbon tied around it, and she almost hates to ruin it by opening it.

But once the gift itself has been revealed, she hardly even notices the remains of the wrapping paper. She holds it up for Will and Hannibal to see, Hannibal’s mouth falling open around a soft, astonished sound when he sees it.

Even from just a first glance, Abigail can tell what it is. The edges of the sketchbook are worn from time and use, and the simple black cover has four stark white lines carved into the bottom right corner. Abigail feels like she would know the _M_ was for Mischa even if the gift hadn’t been addressed from her. She scans the first few pages to see line drawings done in ink and pencil sketches that mimic human anatomy and further back, a few simple cartoonish doodles surrounded by splattered watercolor stains. Every page is filled with art. Abigail can’t stop carefully turning the pages for more. Oblivious to her audience, she stumbles upon a note Mischa left for her. It reads: _A sample of my work, should you decide you want a tattoo after all. ;)_

She closes the book and holds it to her chest, feeling honored and overwhelmed. Will smiles from his place on the couch, one hand on Hannibal’s knee maybe by accident or maybe on purpose.

“I take it you like her gift then,” Hannibal muses, looking and sounding pleased on his sister’s behalf.

“I love it,” she whispers, hoping that’s enough to convey what she thinks of Mischa’s present.

Hannibal beams. “She will be happy to hear it.”

“I bet she’ll like it if you bring it along when we go over later.”

Abigail nods, lowering the sketchbook to her lap and running her fingers over the carving of Mischa’s name. She turns and picks up a present with Will’s name on it, handing it to Hannibal since he’s sitting the closest to her. Hannibal passes it along and accepts the second one Abigail hands to him that has his name on it. 

Among Hannibal’s gifts are a deep purple paisley bathrobe that appears to be made of silk, a mismatched-but-synchronized tie and pocket square Abigail bought for him after seeing the suit he plans on wearing to Will’s debut as a conductor for the Virginia Symphony Orchestra, and a fancy bound book of blank sheet music with monogrammed margins featuring the letters _W.G._ and _H.L._

Hannibal fawns over the bathrobe when he opens it. Abigail takes several pictures of him petting the fabric and eventually shrugging it on over his pajamas. The tie and pocket square receive a similar response, though it takes him a moment to realize that they’re meant to pair with one outfit in particular, which changes his reaction from pleased to downright ecstatic. He shows off the sheet music to Will once he notices the small but important modification that’s been made to the pages. Will blushes at their initials thrown together so boldly, but he relaxes when Abigail points out that now they have to properly write some music together.

Will finds himself entranced enough with that idea that he forgets to be self-conscious. Abigail’s intrigued at the notion, too. Even without rehearsal, they play well in a duet between whichever instruments they choose to pick up. Now that a harmonica’s been thrown into the mix (thanks, Beverly), they’re bound to come up with all sorts of creative melodies.

Speaking of the harmonica Will received—gorgeous, made of curving silver, and inscribed with _Golden Melody_ across the top—his other presents include a book of lovingly photographed dogs, a conducting baton with a rosewood handle, and a Maurice Sendak-inspired mug that says, _I’LL EAT YOU UP I LOVE YOU SO_ inside the silhouette of a Wild Thing.

Abigail heard him make an obscure reference to the book once, so she considered it a safe bet that he’d like it. Judging by the small, surprised smile on his face when he sees it, she didn’t guess wrong.

The rest of her presents consist of crocheted slippers made to look like twin sharks are eating her feet, a collage picture frame that’s empty for now but that she already has ideas for, a gold necklace with a wide set of matching gold antlers for a pendant, a sleek pair of leather gloves, and a purple slouch beanie that will add a nice burst of color when paired with her black winter coat.

It’s a lot, and Abigail doesn’t want to leave her comfy, crowded spot by the tree for pretty much anything in the world. But eventually they do get up to make lunch and then drive over to Mischa’s. Through a series of negotiating tactics that mostly involve puppy dog eyes, Abigail gets them to let her drive. She also gets Will to take the harmonica with him.

From his cozy spot sprawled out in the backseat, the first long notes of the Star Wars Theme ring out. Hannibal furrows his brow at Abigail’s startled laughter, which distracts them briefly from making Will serenade them for the long drive to Baltimore.

After they’ve thoroughly teased Hannibal for never having seen Star Wars, there’s a few minutes of silence in the car followed by a riff Abigail doesn’t recognize. She glances over at Hannibal, noticing how he straightens in his seat after the short second phrase. The drawn pause in between sounds builds a kind of tension in the car, though Abigail can’t take her eyes away from the road long enough to actually watch it unfold. It’s a soft, gently lilting melody. Will sways with it where Abigail can see him in the rearview mirror.

Still before she’s guessed at the song, Will’s stopped and Hannibal’s grinning with the back of his hand pressed to his mouth. She starts to ask but holds back her curiosity, letting the moment remain and then slip away. Will plays something else, vaguely recognizable until it melts into something else that’s definitely nothing she can identify. After a while, he wipes it off on his sleeve and passes it to Hannibal.

He fiddles with a few different scales at first, testing, and then takes off into familiar tunes Abigail can actually name: Amazing Grace, Auld Lang Syne, and On Top of Old Smokey.

For the last one, Will starts belting out the version about spaghetti, making Hannibal flub the end of one phrase. Abigail smiles so hard her cheeks ache. She’s still laughing under her breath when they get to Mischa’s house. It’s chilly outside, but they head to the backyard to play with Bixie and Tian for a little while anyway. Abigail has to dust snow off her brand new beanie before going back into the house, but she’s not cold.

Mischa preens only a little when Abigail tells her how much she loves the sketchbook. By the genuine look of confusion that crosses her face, she hadn’t expected Abigail to bring it with her. She’s excited to discuss it, though, so Abigail has no room to second-guess herself.

“I like this one of the elephant,” she says, flipping right to the page she wants.

With some pink in her cheeks, Mischa smiles and tells her, “In a line drawing just like that? No color? Hmm, we’ll have to mind that the lines won’t blur too unattractively. Will mentioned that you’d like a bird?”

“An osprey,” Abigail confirms, then hesitates. “And a deer, too. One of the left shoulder, the other on the right.”

Mischa gives this suggestion some thought, silently mulling it over. A smile tugs at her lips and she nods, finally raising her gaze from the page to Abigail’s eyes. She says, “Where they can watch over you.”

Abigail opens her mouth to say something, to say yes, to give some kind of explanation, but Mischa doesn’t need an explanation. Actually, Mischa beats her to the punch and leans in a little conspiratorially.

“Do you want to see one of mine?”

Nodding, Abigail looks where Mischa moves her collar out of the way to reveal the sloping shape of a crane. It’s mostly black with some blue shading, but just over her collar bone, the bird’s red plumage sparks through amidst the smoky image. 

“When we were teenagers, we went back to visit our parents. I never quite knew them, not like Hannibal did.” Mischa looks up across the room at her brother when she says this; Abigail looks, too. She continues in a hushed voice while Hannibal sits on the floor by Will to scratch at Tianlu’s belly, which the fluffy white Brittany Spaniel just loves: “Our aunt and uncle took us to the cemetery where they were buried, and to me, it was like meeting them for the first time, odd as that may seem. Hannibal wept like I’d never seen. It was terrible for him to go back.”

“And for you?”

“I didn’t remember it being home once upon a time.” Mischa draws a circle over the bird’s narrow beak. “I mostly found it peaceful. Just before we left, a flock of cranes flew up overhead. They looked so graceful with their magnificent wings and their necks so long.”

She looks down and lets her collar slide back into place. A rueful little smile sits on her lips.

“I wanted this tattoo ever since that day. I felt like having it would allow me to feel closer to them, never far away from that moment when we were children and the cranes flew above us for the sun.”

Abigail smiles, too, eyes stinging.

“That’s beautiful,” she says.

“Memories can have so much power if we let them,” Mischa murmurs, smiling still, but brighter now. Her eyes are a little red to match Abigail’s. “They can even heal us if we’re creative about it.”

Right at that moment, the tiny tortie kitten rushes into the kitchen on clumsy feet. Mischa’s black kitten tumbles in after her, attempting to run faster than her tiny legs can properly accommodate. They slide on the floor and crash one after the other into the cabinets and Abigail makes some kind of wordless exclamation before picking up the orange-speckled kitten. Mischa picks up the remaining black one and coos at her.

“Their names?” Abigail asks after a moment just making kissy faces at the spooked tortie in her arms.

“That one is Kačiukas, and this darling girl is Bagheera. Not incredibly original, I’ll admit, either of them.”

“They’re very cute. Their names could be Spot and Blackie and they’d still be cute.”

“Did you know,” Will says, catching the last bit of their conversation as he walks into the kitchen, “that Cerberus means ‘spotted’? Oof, thank you.”

He juggles the tortie kitten called Kačiukas and gratefully lets Hannibal extract her from his hands. She immediately settles in his arms, much to Will’s affront. Hannibal shrugs and nudges gently at her forehead with one finger until her eyes slip closed. A high trilling purr trips out of her, made more adorable for Will’s obvious frown in the background.

“She knows you’re her dad,” Abigail teases.

Hannibal smiles, charmed at the notion of such a small animal flocking to him like a child. Kačiukas fits in the cradle of his arms just like an especially tiny baby.

“Bixie and Tian don’t mind them?”

“Oh, they’re the real surrogate parents,” Mischa confirms. “I just keep them fed and watered. This one likes to use Bixie as a bed. In no organized fashion, mind you. Just any part of her that she can climb up onto at any given time.”

Bagheera flails, somehow knowing that she’s being discussed and apparently having none of it. Mischa tuts and sets her on the ground where she promptly sprints into the living room to attack Tianlu’s sleeping form. He barely even flinches. 

“And Kačiukas?” Hannibal asks, the kitten chirping in his arms where she’s now trying to climb up his shirt. “Does she like them?”

“As much as she’s bound to like anyone, I think. A bit of a prickly pear, that one.”

Hannibal hums, carefully plucking said prickly pear’s claws from his shoulder. Abigail watches him look from the kitten to Will and then back before placing her on the floor to trot in the same direction that Bagheera did. It’s not hard to anticipate his train of thought. Will’s dogs could probably be persuaded to like a cat, but if Kačiukas is an indoor cat now, the transition to being a sometimes-outdoor cat might not go over well.

Then again, Hannibal’s big roomy house—the house he hasn’t spent much time in since coming home from the tour—might be a more palatable option, especially since Kačiukas could end up more disposed to being in a one-pet household. Abigail can see him thinking that over, too, trying to balance what’s best for the kitten against what he knows he wants most for himself.

Abigail’s been there; has pondered living arrangements and attachments and the future, all that. The holidays can be good for making people re-evaluate what’s most important to them. 

Nobody else seems to notice Hannibal’s conflict, so Abigail doesn’t bring it up then or on the ride back home. They make Will drive and take turns passing the harmonica back and forth. Hannibal teaches her to play Shenandoah, which Abigail gets the hang of fairly quickly once she learns how to vibrate the notes. It’s peaceful, a little mournful-sounding, and for that reason, reminds her of what she’ll be doing tomorrow.

“Do you think lilies?” she asks Hannibal, apropos of nothing in particular since they hadn’t really been talking at all outside of his instruction for the song. “I’m going to the cemetery tomorrow.”

“White for purity,” Hannibal says after a moment. “Stargazer lilies to represent sympathy.”

“My mom liked tulips,” she adds after a few seconds pass in silence. Playing around a little more on the harmonica, mostly picking out the notes she can hear where Hannibal’s lesson trails off and the rest of Shenandoah begins. “The yellow ones were her favorite. What does yellow mean?”

“Cheerfulness,” he tells her without any hesitation. “As one would think of the sun.”

Looking out the window, Abigail murmurs, “Maybe not yellow.”

“White would mean forgiveness,” Hannibal suggests, perfectly neutral in both tone and expression when he glances back at her in the side mirror. “And red would denote love, but tulips generally signify perfect love, regardless of color.”

Abigail thinks about it, looking over at Will after a time when he’s said nothing to contribute to the conversation. She sees him reach for Hannibal’s hand across the center console, remaining silent but smiling faintly anyway.

In the end, Abigail goes with the stargazer lilies and the white tulips. She asks Marissa to drive her to the cemetery in the late afternoon after she’s come back from lunch with her mom. The gravestone with both their names carved into it has some muddy slush creeping in over the sides. Abigail scrubs away at it with her bare hands and places the lilies on the side that corresponds with her mom’s name. She places the tulips over the side that bears her dad’s name. They won’t last long with the snow and the cold, but that’s not really the point.

For a long time she stays crouched in front of the black slab half-obscured by flowers and by the walls of snow that Abigail could only push away so far. She stares at the etchings of their names, remembers their faces and their voices, and starts to cry at the thought of someday forgetting what they sounded like, what their eyes looked like when they were laughing so hard they could barely breathe.

“I miss you,” she says, to both of them, and then to her mom specifically. “Will is taking care of me now. Sometimes, um, I take care of him. We’re kind of new at this. There’s problems every now and then. I sabotaged his coffee once. It was really funny. I did it right after I…right after he brought me back from the hospital.

“I didn’t…it’s so hard doing this without you. Sometimes I still wake up in the morning feeling like it’s impossible to keep going. What kid wants to be alone?”

She sniffles, rubs at her nose quickly, and then scrubs at her eyes with the back of her hand.

“I’m not alone, though. It took a long time to realize that. I hope…I hope that if you’re watching over me still, that maybe you can accept my new family. They’ve…” She closes her eyes and covers them for just a moment, finding her strength. The tears on her face feel like they may freeze if she doesn’t mind them. “They’ve been so good to me. I really love them. I love you, too. I think of you all the time.”

The lilies are as white as the snow covering the ground. The petals don’t glitter the same way in the sun.

“Merry Christmas. Don’t worry about me.”

Standing and brushing the ends of her coat for snow, Abigail pulls herself together and walks back for Marissa’s car. She smiles when Abigail gets in and gives her a moment to fully regain her composure before showing her the screen on her phone. It’s a group text from Molly and Clarice asking if they want to go see a movie later. Abigail rolls her eyes at Marissa’s suggestive eyebrow dance and gives her the go-ahead to tell them yes. 

They drive back to Marissa’s to play with her little blonde kitten, Marlowe, until the screening they all agreed on starts. Abigail shoots Will a text with her whereabouts and plans for the day. He replies pretty generically but adds a smiley face.

Smothering her laugh with a smirk, Abigail types, _Thank you, Hannibal._

There’s a few seconds of silence, and then:

_Of course, Abigail._

And:

_:)_

That time, she does laugh. She laughs so hard she startles Marlowe where she’d been napping on Marissa’s stomach. It’s hard to regret it.

It’s hard to regret anything, feeling this peaceful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys. I'm so sorry this took forever. I started writing other things and time passed, and whenever I did try to come back to this fic, I felt like someone else had written it. Some beautiful person in the comments suggested that in the spirit of the holidays matching up somewhat with the time of year that the fic's currently in, maybe I could attempt picking the story back up.
> 
> So, well, I tried? Hang in there with my inconsistent ass for one more chapter and by God we'll make it out of this fluff monster fic. This I swear by the stars.

**Author's Note:**

> Lyrics by The Rolling Stones.


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